Little Prince
by Scheming Rabbit
Summary: Iemitsu is not the only one with a notable bloodline. Nana's lineage claimed Tsuna long before Reborn came to train him for the Vongola. When Reborn goes to Namimori to train the Decimo, he only finds an empty house. Or: in which Tsuna is a prince. Tentatively All27. Side 8059 (or working on it, at least). Shounen-ai/slash/yaoi.
1. Chapter 1

Reborn walked on the edge of the walls separating the houses from each other, balancing with a practiced ease. Leon was perched on the rim of his fedora, alert and ready as usual.

Reborn's new mission consisted of nearly the same details as his previous one—to train the heir of a strong mafia family. This time it was for Vongola, not Cavallone, but it seemed that the kid he was going to train was just like his previous student—clumsy and useless. According to Iemitsu, Sawada Tsunayoshi is a shy (cowardly), pacifistic (weak), academically-challenged (dumb) child that needs a gentle guiding hand (Reborn snorted, though unnoticeably). All of that would be beaten out of him soon enough.

He hopped down from the wall when he reached the address Iemitsu gave him, but the house he saw did not appear to have any residents. Plants were overtaking the yard, the windows were grimy with dirt, and the wooden frames of the door and windows were chipped away from the elements. Reborn took Leon's cell phone form and called the Young Lion.

"Reborn! How are my wife and cute son doing?" the excited voice burst out of the speakers. Reborn's eyebrow twitched.

"Iemitsu, you are an idiot, aren't you? You should at least give me the correct information so that I don't waste my time. The house you sent me to is empty."

Iemitsu confusedly looked at his phone. "What are you talking about? I did give you the right address. I checked it twice before I sent the info. There's no way that I would forget my own house."

Reborn opened the rusted gate, walked out, and took a closer look at the house. The nameplate, though old and obviously not taken care of, had the name 'Sawada' etched into it. So this was their house, but no one lived here anymore. Another sweep and he noted that, although the house looked uncared for, there were no signs of a break-in or a struggle. _So they left voluntarily._ "Iemitsu, when have you last visited your family?"

"Hm? What does that have to do with anything? They're safe, aren't they?" he replied uncaringly, fiddling with his pen that he was supposed to be using to fill out the paperwork nearly overflowing on his desk.

"I wouldn't know that, would I? They're not where they're supposed to be, according to what you say. The house looks like it's been abandoned for years."

"What are you talking about? They wouldn't have left; they have no reason to. Besides, they would have told me first," Iemitsu denied, flipping the pen around his fingers. He forgot that he had never left any contact info for his dear wife in case an enemy ever traced her to him.

Reborn tilted his fedora over his eyes in annoyance. Iemitsu was not giving the appropriate amount of concern on this topic. He growled into the Leon-phone, "Well I can't do anything about this. From what I see, your wife left of her own will."

"And I told you, she wouldn't have done that. She's probably visiting a friend. If that's all, I have work to do." Iemitsu hung up and continued "working", i.e. playing with the pen.

Oregano pushed open the door to the office with another stack of papers in her arms. When she saw that her boss was disregarding his work, she slammed the papers in front of him, snatched the pen out of his hands, and said with a cool aura, "If you don't start working, I'll give you a reason why you are unable to."

Iemitsu hesitantly picked the pen back up and started signing.

Meanwhile, Reborn was cultivating a dark aura about him as Leon skittered back to his spot on the fedora. Well, there was nothing for him to do here. It was evident that Iemitsu was unaware of his familial situation and he had just wasted his time. Reborn would just have to return to Italy and report to Nono that the Vongola heir was missing. He would let Nono deal with Iemitsu; that would be satisfying, at least.

If Reborn had bothered to enter the house and look around, he would have found a note yellowed with age addressed to Iemitsu on the nightstand in the master bedroom. As it was, it would not be found until much later.

_Hello, Dear,_

_If you are reading this, then you noticed that we are not in this house anymore. I'm sorry that I couldn't tell you directly, but you didn't give me a phone number to call you._

_Tsu-kun and I need to leave. My grandfather needs us to inherit his job. It's quite an interesting one, too! Tsu-kun's going to be a king! I'm going to be his regent while he grows up. Doesn't that sound fun? I wish Tsu-kun could have had a normal childhood, but this is very important. If my older brother hadn't died, he would have taken the throne, but since he did and he left no heir, Tsu-kun is the only choice left._

_When you aren't busy with your construction work, come and see us sometime! We're going to be at Merith, the place that I told you I wanted to go to during our anniversary three years ago._

_Hope to see you soon,_

_Your darling, Nana_

* * *

><p>The country of Merith was at 140 degrees north and 0 degrees latitude, in the equator and south of Japan. The island country, though not abundant in industry, made use of its fertile land to raise fruits to make the sweetest wines in the world. Unlike many modern countries, Merith still used the monarch system, but the royal family of Alsveith was dwindling in numbers. Currently, the family consisted of the king—who was getting on in years—his daughter, and her son—his grandson.<p>

The king had previously thought that with his death, the country would fall apart since only people with Alsveith blood could keep control of the island. He wasn't referring to the people, oh no—the people were kind and could probably civilly live among each other even without a leading head for at least several generations before a power-seeking individual comes along and makes a grasp for control. He was talking about the land itself.

The lore specific to the land told of a shipwreck survivor that had drifted onto the island many centuries ago. Supposedly, the man had fallen in love with one of the spirits that controlled the island's weather and life, and he was loved back. The couple bonded and had a child. When more shipwreck survivors swept onto the shore, a human population was established, and the spirit couple became their rulers. A few centuries later, outside nations found the country and plotted it on their maps, but none attempted to overtake its territory. For some reason, storms would roll in quickly and the sea would become treacherous whenever a hostile presence approached. Merith became a neutral country, and no one tried to change that after the first fleets of ships and planes were sunken well beneath the deceptive waves usually so calm.

Very few believed in the myth, and only those working intimately in palace politics knew that parts of it were true. Spirits did exist on the island, and the country did in fact require those of the spirit bloodline to lead it, the reason being a contract between that first human and the spirits. The first contract specified that the human could live on the land as long as he did not ruin it like the spirits had seen humans do on the larger landmasses. In return, the human would make periodic offerings and keep control over any other humans that may appear. A breech in the contract would result in the complete eradication of any humans living on the land, no exceptions. When a Gale Fox became closely _acquainted_ with the man, the relationship between the spirits and the human turned friendlier. After more human began arriving on the island, the contract was modified to give them permission to have a small amount of industry as long as it did not excessively pollute the land and there were more areas with natural marks (i.e. trees) than factories.

The humans developed a system that fitted both the spirits' and humans' needs. Sweet fruits were modified and cultivated so that wines could be produced to trade for items that they couldn't make on the island. In this way, fruit trees were abundant and factories only produced items for the bare necessity, keeping inevitable pollution at a minimum. Luxury items were traded for. Both were happy.

It is in this island country called Merith that Tsuna lived in for seven years since he was seven. From what he remembered, Japan was a nice country, but the kids were not as nice. Just because he was quieter than most, he was picked on. Tsuna did not miss that at all.

When his mother got a letter and said that they would be moving to her home country, Tsuna had been a bit hesitant in leaving the only place he had been happy in. However, when he met his grandfather (who was surrounded by guys in black like the people in those cool spy movies) and got a warm welcome, he was not regretful at all in leaving his first home.

What he did dislike were the boring lessons that he has to endure as the prince and heir to the throne. (Like his mother wrote in the letter, she was acting as his regent while he prepared to take over. His grandfather had retired and was acting as a guiding hand rather than actively taking part in running the country.) Repeatedly, he slipped out of his bedroom window and climbed down the sakura tree placed conveniently nearby (at least for him; the guards that had to chase him down grew a dislike for that tree when they found that was how he escaped) whenever he could. The first few escapades ended quickly because of his notable clothes. The gold-stitching lined white flowing shirt and pants along with the small crown did not help him at all. After learning his mistake, Tsuna changed out of his formal clothes and instead donned plain brown garments. It helped him blend into the townspeople better, but the guards learned to pick out his distinct fluffy hair. Tsuna then started to wear a hood. Now the guards had to search out a small boy in plain clothes that covered his hair. Tsuna was thankful that they had difficulties with that. He did not want to start cross-dressing to escape them.

Currently, he was crouching behind a fruit stall while eating a peach and keeping watch for black-clad men. Out of all of the fruits that Merith grew, peaches were his favorite. He was not old enough to drink the wine that Merith was famous for, but he did enjoy the peach tea that was popular among the younger ages. Usually, he made a short stop to the orchard beside the castle to pluck a ripe peach to eat while making a short venture through the town before the guards found him and dragged him back.

He adjusted the dull green hood to make sure it was covering his face before stepping back into the crowd and following the flow deeper into town. He hoped to see something interesting before being forced into his lessons again.

* * *

><p>Reborn stepped out of the ship and onto the dock. After informing Nono about his missing heir, he was sent to renew the ten-year trade alliance for Vongola Trading Company with one of its best fruit providers. Usually, he did not appreciate being used as an errand boy, but Reborn recognized that Nono was giving him a chance to cool off his anger at the Young Lion and have a break. Regrettably, because of his new "mission", he was not there to witness the chewing out that Iemitsu got. As unfortunate as that was, he would at least be able to get a few bottles of his favorite wines at a lower price than they would be in Italy. Even though he was as rich as he was, he still did not like to spend money freely, and Merith's wine was expensive even without the import costs, but it was definitely worth it.<p>

Reborn smirked and walked toward Alsveith Castle, anticipating the delicious fruits and drinks he would be served during the meeting with the current ruler, a woman named Nana la Alsveith.

* * *

><p>Sorry for the boring country backstory.<p>

I'm thinking of putting in a few minor crossovers (Bleach and Kuroshitsuji). Suggestions?

I'd also appreciate a name suggestion to replace Merith. That was just a name that came into my head. No idea where it's from. Maybe also a title suggestion… I see I suck with names.

About Tsuna and Nana's name change: I figured that they should have the royal name. Sawada would be a hidden middle name... or something. It's still there somewhere.

About the spirits: I see them as humanoid figures with animalistic characteristics (like the ears and tails).


	2. Chapter 2

Reborn walked through the marketplace, perusing the fruits that were being presented. It seemed that his favorite selection of pomegranates were available. Reborn happily took advantage of his infantile form to accept free wedges of fruit, although he kept his fingers clean and avoided the sticky juice. It would not do to look messy in front of the queen. Being stuck in a baby's body was enough of a hit to his pride.

As he plucked out the seeds of a pomegranate, occasionally tossing some up for Leon, he noticed a small hooded child saying quick pleasantries at one stall then moving to the next to do the same. At each stop, the boy was given a slice of fruit or an affectionate pat on the head. Was the kid a beggar? He wasn't wearing as high-quality clothes as the rest of the people milling around the area and he was being given food by the vendors—probably taking advantage of their kind nature. He was smart for a street kid, but that wouldn't exempt him from Reborn's tendency to snatch food out of unsuspecting people's hands.

With his speed, Reborn had no trouble catching up to the kid and jumping on his shoulder. With Leon transformed into tongs, he picked up an apple piece from the boy's arms and announced his presence. "Ciaossu."

The kid startled, nearly dropping a pear. "Ah! Who're you?" he asked in a questionably high tone for a boy his age. Reborn estimated him to be thirteen, possibly fourteen. The boy, from what he could see of him, had clear brown eyes and soft brown hair. Common colors. Reborn thought he saw a flash of another color in his eyes, but it was gone before he could pinpoint it. Red? Orange? Other than that and his short stature, there was nothing notable about the boy.

Reborn took the apple and ate it in one bite. "I'm a delegate of Vongola Trading Company, Reborn. I need to meet with the queen," he said callously, aware that he would most likely be disregarded because of his apparent age.

However, what he did not expect was for the boy to simply nod and say, "I see. I can lead you there if you don't know where to go." The boy gave him a bright smile. Reborn looked at the boy suspiciously. Either this kid was gullible or he had higher senses than most and could tell that he was not as he appeared. The latter types were very rare; most people were fooled by his infantile body unless they were aware of his status as the Sun Arcobaleno.

Reborn was about to agree (because then he'd get a free ride while also being able to have easy access to fruits), but then a stream of palace soldiers flooded the narrow streets, inquiring about a missing person. _Who? A convict?_

"He got out again, huh?" a stall keeper behind Reborn amusedly asked her customer.

"It looks like it. It's been a while since he was able to get out. I think the last time was two months ago. He must've been kept very busy," the customer replied while picking up her purchase. She left without a backward glance, as if this was a common occurrence.

Reborn jumped off the boy's shoulder, nearly pushing him off-balance, and landed on the counter of the stall. "Ciaossu. Who is it that's gone missing?" he inquired.

The stall keeper turned to him. "Eh? Oh, what a cute baby. Where's your mother, young one? Would you like a peach?" She handed him a small slice of peach on a toothpick. Reborn took it and ate it cutely while looking at her, urging her to answer his question. She then said, "The prince has a habit of escaping into the town when he gets too bored. That child." She sighed affectionately.

_So the prince doesn't like to work_, Reborn concluded. _Lazy or just not prepared for the position?_ "Why does he run out of the palace? There must be something to do at the castle," he pointed out reasonably.

"If the prince stayed in the castle, the guards would be able to find him faster, so there is less 'break-time' for him. Her Majesty doesn't care; she thinks her son needs it, and I agree. The boy shouldn't have to do so much right now, but I guess it needs to happen. The king has already retired and his daughter—the queen—is only a regent for the prince, her son. He needs to grow up fast to take the throne. It's his duty and birthright."

_The system is rather like the mafia; he can't back out._ Reborn quietly slipped away and looked for the boy that collected free fruit, but he had disappeared. _Strange; I didn't even notice._ Reborn disregarded the thought and quickly forgot about him. It didn't matter to him. He could see the castle in the distance. He could just guess his way there; he had good intuition.

* * *

><p>The hooded boy was thankful that the oddly tiny delegate left him. This way there would be no questions as he concealed himself inside a stall, coincidentally stocked with cans of peach tea. Tsuna pulled out his money pouch, which was in the form of a soot gremlin hung on a necklace, and took out a few bills to put in place of a can. He opened the can and took a sip while watching the guards leave the area. He smirked, pleased. His escaping and evading skills had improved. Unlike the previous jaunt through town, he lasted a whole three hours without having been spotted once. Maybe his next one would be even better.<p>

Laughing quietly, Tsuna got to his feet and dusted away the small amount of dirt that had accumulated on the hem of his pants. He ducked out of the stall and continued his unofficial "break-time", applauding himself mentally all the while. Unfortunately, his victory cheer was cut short by an approaching person, who he accidentally bumped into. Tsuna looked up and paled. He nervously gave a tiny grin. "Ehehe… Hi?"

* * *

><p>Reborn was let through the ornate gates and led into the grand castle. He settled into the meeting room while waiting for the queen to come. He took a seat at the table and consumed the small snacks that were placed before him. Although Merith had a monarch system, it was not so archaic as to make visitors wait on bended knee for the queen's acknowledgment.<p>

Just under ten minutes, the door opened and the queen stepped in. Queen Nana la Alsveith… Reborn's eyes snapped to her face, and a jolt of recognition flashed through him. He knew that face; he saw it in a picture that Iemitsu had been waving at him while bragging about his family. Nana la Alsveith… Nana… Sawada? He was sure this woman was Iemitsu's wife. So this was where she had disappeared to. Was Iemitsu aware of her position? No, that idiot only saw her as a helpless, normal housewife. Oh, if only he knew… Reborn would have fun with this…

Another thought struck him then. If Iemitsu's wife was the queen, then Tsunayoshi was the prince. This might make a small bump in Vongola's plans…

"Greetings, your majesty," Reborn said in his high voice, bowing shortly. Leon gave a tiny nod to her.

The queen covered her mouth with one hand and laughed quietly. "Goodness, even after seven years of this I'm not used to it," she told him. "Feel free to call me Nana. I'm much more used to being called 'Mama', but that wouldn't be appropriate here."

"Nana, then," Reborn agreed. "I'm here on behalf of the Vongola Trading Company to renew the trading alliance for fruits and wines. The president wishes it to be ten years with the same terms. Is that okay with you?"

"Oh! I forgot to tell you I passed the trading overseeing to my son. I'm not updated on the product status anymore; I'm completely uninvolved in that area. He took over two years ago. I thought it might be too much for him since he was only twelve at the time and he'd only just finished learning about our country's economy, but he flourished. I had nothing to worry about. I'm so proud of him!" Nana clapped her hands together in motherly joy.

_Ho? So he's actually capable of bearing the work? Then he skips because of dislike for the work._ "Does that mean I have to meet with the prince to conclude the contract?" Reborn turned his mind back to his current mission. It wasn't necessary for him to know why the prince liked to slip away from his duties, although analyzing psychology was always entertaining. It was the reason why he could predict people's thoughts and actions so easily and make it appear as if he could read their minds.

"Yes, but I'm sorry that you'll have to wait for a bit. Tsu-kun seems to have gone to the town again." Nana delicately picked up a hors d'oeuvre and took a small bite. Reborn took one as well. Both sat quietly, enjoying the snacks and thinking about the situation. Leon crawled down from his perch and snagged his own treat. Soon enough, all of the tiny delicacies were gone and they started their discussion again.

Nana started first. "I know he's young and relatively new in this field, but it would be good for you if you do not underestimate him. He's rapidly learned how to handle his duties, and I trust him to do this. He's actually quite skilled with finances and learns from his mistakes. I'm not saying this to boast as a mother—well, maybe a little. He really is ready for this. He might even pull more benefits for us in this coming contract. That's how confident I am."

Reborn smirked at the thought of a possible challenge. _Not so dame, are you, Tsunayoshi?_ Iemitsu really has missed a lot of his only son's development—and such a large jump, too. From a common, even below-average kid to a capable little prince. _Maybe even mafia boss in the future._

"I'll keep that in mind when I meet with him," Reborn assured. Then he abruptly changed the subject; surprising his subjects always gave him the most candid answers. He presented the question for his original mission, "What do you think of your son becoming the head of a mafia famiglia sometime in the future?"

* * *

><p>Contrary to what many people may think, Nana was not as oblivious as her outward persona projected. It was just a front. Aside from being a source of entertainment from seeing people so befuddled at her seeming ignorance, it was a good strategy at picking out hidden intentions. People let their guard down around her when she did so, and so it was an efficient way in figuring out any ulterior motives.<p>

She knew that Reborn really did come to Merith for the trading contract, but now she also knew that he had been searching for her son to be the heir of a criminal organization. She could tell that Reborn was serious in what he was asking; that glint in his eyes told her all she needed about the validity. What she wanted to know was how he became connected in this. Mafia groups were strict in their choices of succession; they were bound by blood, and from what she had gleaned from her family tree, none of her ancestors had been involved in the mafia. Considering that many were either spirits or the ruling monarch in their time, most never even had a chance in getting tangled in criminal organizations in Italy.

Since her side of the family tree was impossible, she turned her thoughts to her husband's. Iemitsu had been very secretive in his relations, but she had never given much thought to it until now. If he had known of such a shady background in his family, then it was likely that was the reason he never bragged about his ancestors, unlike he did about his wife and child. Maybe he was directly involved as well… It would certainly explain his odd postcards. They were a weak cover-up for his true job. There was no way he actually directed penguins in the arctic, especially in just a thin t-shirt and pants.

Nana really had no problem with Tsuna's possible link to the mafia. It was his choice what to do in his life. She was definitely not a controlling mother. She believed that Tsuna making his own choices would help him grow better than if she were to push him into the directions she wanted. Besides, she trusted his judgment and character. Tsuna wouldn't turn to violence even if he chose to enter the mafia. He had never liked fighting, even in the videogames that other kids his age loved to play. He had a strong moral compass and liked to help people. If he ever did become a mafia boss, he certainly would not be like any other. (Unknown to her, there was, in fact, a past mafia boss that Tsuna was quite similar to—the founder of the famiglia Tsuna was supposed to inherit, in fact.)

So she just smiled disarmingly to Reborn and told him, "I wouldn't mind. It's Tsuna's choice, isn't it?"

Reborn readily agreed, "Of course," yet his inner thoughts showed otherwise. _Not if I have a say in it. I will definitely make him the next Vongola boss._

He would not relinquish his perfect mission record, not even for royalty.

* * *

><p>Tsuna had finally been apprehended in the marketplace. His guards surrounded him in a close circle, keeping people away from him while also making sure he couldn't give them the slip.<p>

"Really, can't you just endure your lessons? They can't be that bad, can they?" Tsuna's primary guard asked him.

"You wouldn't get it since _you_ don't have him as a teacher. He's _scary_ when he's angry, and it doesn't take much to aggravate him. He doesn't look angry, but I can sense his danger levels increase by a lot," Tsuna retorted. He was perched on his guard's arm with his arm loosely around his guard's head. When the guard lightly tripped on a small rock and jolted him, Tsuna reflexively pulled on the orange hair twined between his fingers.

"Ow! What was that for? You know I didn't do it on purpose." Ichigo rubbed at his pulled scalp with his free hand.

Tsuna immediately apologized. "Sorry. That was an accident."

Ichigo Kurosaki was in charge of Tsuna's security. He was thrust into the job by his dad, who was the head of security at the castle. He didn't mind having the job, though. Tsuna was a good kid—and he liked to carry him. His sisters, Yuzu and Karin, didn't let him do that to them anymore, saying they were grown up, but middle-school age was still very young—at least in his opinion. He didn't understand why they wanted to grow up so fast. He himself was a high-school student but had a high-end job; it was taxing on his mind, especially because Tsuna seemed to like to make his job harder. Ichigo had to learn to balance his grades and his guard duties, if only not to disappoint his father, an easy-to-please imbecile though he was.

"You know that Byakuya's probably mad at you now. After all, you disappeared just fifteen minutes before your lessons with him started," Ichigo reminded him.

Tsuna shivered imperceptibly in fear. "I can't help that calligraphy is hard. I only managed to master writing the letters neatly just two weeks ago. He can't expect me to write full paragraphs now, can he?"

"Byakuya holds high expectations on you. That just means that you have to work harder, don't you?"

"But I'm already working hard…" Tsuna sulked.

By that point, they had reached the castle gates. The guards posted there let them through, and Tsuna was finally let down on his feet now that he was within boundaries and under the guards' eyes, therefore unable to make an immediate getaway.

Tsuna abandoned any further thoughts of making an escape when he saw Ichigo keeping a close watch on him. He sighed and prepared to undergo another scolding from his calligraphy teacher, Byakuya Kuchiki, who was also the head of a noble family and one of the captains of the army. Even without the last title he would be intimidating. He had a cold, silver gaze that rarely melted—supposedly only in the presence of his wife, Hisana, and her sister, Rukia.

Tsuna entered through the castle doors, which the guards opened for him. First he went to his bedroom to change out of his "commoner's clothes". He got back into his formal attire after a quick rinse in his private shower. Then he headed toward his study on the third floor, which is where he should have been nearly four hours ago. He groaned. Captain Kuchiki would definitely be angry with him.

He timidly opened the oak doors and peeked his head through, hoping to first see just how mad he might be. Oddly, he could see no one there. Confused, Tsuna pushed open the doors all the way and walked in, taking cautious, quiet steps, just in case the captain was hiding somewhere to scare him. _Don't be ridiculous; he would never do that. That would degrade his pride._ Tsuna stopped tiptoeing at the sensible thought and walked normally to his desk. _He must've gotten tired of waiting for me. I'll have to apologize next time. Maybe sakura tea will soften him?_

Well, if he didn't have lessons, then he had to finish his paperwork. Thankfully, he had completed the majority of it before he went on his little jaunt. All he needed to do was evaluate the appeal for the establishment of a new village in the north, judge the fairness of a court case, and read over a contract for approval.

He needed to see if the spirits were okay with the humans settling there first… He'd have to plan an outing to the northern shrines then. Well, at least he had an excuse to go out now. Tsuna found nothing alarming in his senses about the court case, so he stamped it and put it aside.

He picked up the contract and carefully read over it. Most of it was the same as the previous version, which he had studied a few years ago during an economy lesson. Only a few minor adjustments had been made to accommodate the changes the world had gone through in the ten-year period that the old contract had lasted. If he added a clause here and deleted this… and maybe put in a stipulation there, Merith would have more flexibility in the relationship with Vongola Trading Company. Tsuna made a few more tweaks to the contract until he felt it would satisfy both sides. He read over it again to make sure there were no loopholes that may cause future problems before he signed the bottom and set it aside to discuss with the representative. Speaking of which, he should be here now, right? He looked up, about to rise from his seat, but then he noticed his audience that had been waiting patiently for him.

* * *

><p>Ichigo posted two guards in the study with Tsuna and another two at the door. With that settled, he went to report to the queen about her son's return. After this, maybe he'd be able to take a break. But then again, he shouldn't get his hopes up. The last time he had a similar thought, he ended up in the western districts having to appease a peacock that Tsuna somehow ended up angering. He hadn't even known there were peacocks in Merith before. Then the time before that he had to track Tsuna into the farthest eastern district because Tsuna accidentally took the wrong canal when he was trying to go into the first eastern district. When he found him, Tsuna was making flower crowns with local children. Byakuya had not been pleased when Tsuna was an hour late to his lesson. Ichigo's daily spar with him that day had been particularly painful.<p>

Ichigo nodded to the guards keeping watch over the meeting room before he knocked and entered. Two people were inside the room. One was a small baby in a suit and fedora with a chameleon. The large yellow pacifier contrasted with the rest of the baby's outfit, but it was oddly fitting. The other was the queen he was there to see. He gave her a formal bow before stating, "I found the prince in the first northern district's marketplace. He encountered no danger." _Thankfully, _he added mentally. "He's currently in his study working."

"Oh? He's back now? It's been longer than his usual time, hasn't it?" the queen responded. "I guess we better go see him. Come, Reborn." She stood from her plush seat and motioned to the little baby to follow her. Contrary to Ichigo's expectation, the baby rose fluidly from his seat and hopped down with no trouble. Ichigo followed the duo out of the room, and the two guards that had been at the door took their positions at the front and back of the group.

* * *

><p>The silent procession made its way to the third floor study room, where another two guards were posted, signifying the prince's presence. They opened the doors for them and allowed entrance. Inside the room was a short brunet sitting at a large desk with only a few pieces of paper around him. His head was down, looking intensely at the page in front of him while he made a few occasional marks. They watched him for a couple minutes while he finished and looped a signature at the end.<p>

_He's highly focused on his task and too open to attacks. I'll need to train him to raise his awareness of his surroundings._

The boy raised his head, and Reborn finally got a good look at his face. _It looks like I'm meeting a lot of coincidences today._ Reborn laughed amusedly in his mind.

The boy was the "beggar" he stole fruit from just a short while ago.

Tsuna grinned. "Hello. You needed to meet with me?"

* * *

><p>Tsuna led Reborn into a smaller private room more suitable for negotiations. He brought his revised version of the contract to go over with the small delegate.<p>

He had known that they would meet again soon when Reborn introduced himself at the marketplace. His mother was not in charge of trade anymore, so meeting with the queen as Reborn said he would was useless. Business management was in his hands, and he was proficient in it, if he could say so himself.

The negotiations only took five minutes since there were no glaring negative effects either could perceive from the edited contract. An official contract was sent off to be typed and printed. One copy would stay with Tsuna; the other would go with Reborn back to Italy to be handed off to Nono.

"Well, I guess we're done here. I wish for our continued alliance to extend far into the future." Tsuna stretched and made to leave the room, but Reborn stopped him. "Hold it. There are a few more matters that I would like to discuss with you."

Tsuna turned curiously toward him. "Like what?" He settled back into his seat.

"Before I came here, I was supposed to tutor a kid so that he could take the seat of the… _company_ his dad worked at. But when I went to the house he was supposed to live in with his mother, there was no one there. Can you guess why?" Reborn inquired.

Tsuna knew where he was leading the conversation. The situations were much too similar. He responded, "Because by then we had been long gone. So Tou-san never noticed that we had left." Tsuna frowned, displeased with how blasé his father was about his family. Did he even care? It's been at least seven years since their last contact.

"I called your father and he told me you were definitely there. I just proved him wrong. He's nearly four thousand kilometers off." Reborn would hold this over his head for a while. The CEDEF leader couldn't even keep tabs on his own family.

Tsuna sighed tiredly. "Well, what is the point of this? I doubt a tutoring job is that important to you. Someone else can take the company head position anyways. I'm already quite busy learning how to run this kingdom along with the duties I have been given."

Reborn shook his head. "Actually, no one else is eligible. The position is handed down according to bloodline. All of the current head's children have either mysteriously passed away or disappeared. You are descended from the original company's founder, unlike Nono; he is descended from a cousin."

"Why does blood matter here? It's just a company, isn't it?" Tsuna stared suspiciously at Reborn.

"And that's where you're wrong. Vongola Trading Company is a branch of the main enterprise, but even that is only a front to cover the true face. Vongola is the largest, strongest mafia group in the world, uncontested for centuries since its establishment."

Tsuna froze shortly, turning the thought over in his mind. Eventually, he relaxed. "Ah. Well, that would explain it. They're strict with their successions because of the 'family ties', right?" Tsuna realized. It was his duty to protect his people. If he was "family", then they couldn't hurt him or anyone under his protection, which included the kingdom. In that case, they were not a danger to his domain, and that was all that mattered.

Reborn nodded, but then added, "Vongola is not like most mafia groups. It goes even further because of a requirement that absolutely must be fulfilled. The founder had been given a set of seven rings, each corresponding to an aspect of the sky. The main one, the Sky Ring, is the one that matters most as it is the 'leader' of the other six. It has some amount of sentience, and the heir must be accepted by the ring or else it is impossible to become the head. The ring only accepts people related to the first leader, who we call Primo. Basically, if you don't become the head, Vongola will collapse."

Tsuna rubbed his eyes from fatigue. "And why should it matter to me if an organized crime group falls apart? I'm not interested in leading violent, bloody people to commit moral atrocities."

"Would your opinion change if I told you that it was originally a vigilante group?"

Tsuna blinked and perked up a bit at that. "What do you mean?"

"Primo first gathered a close group of friends to defend his poor village from common thieves and murderers. With time, the group expanded and became a line of defense against crime. But when Primo wanted to retire, he had no children at the time, so he passed the title down to his cousin. Unlike him, however, Secondo used Vongola for crime and it became the strongest criminal group. The two most recent heads have been gradually trying to undo Vongola's bloody history, but have been mostly unsuccessful. A larger push is needed."

Tsuna understood the hint. "You want me to take over and turn Vongola back into a vigilante group," he said, entertained by the thought.

"I didn't say anything like that, but if that was to happen… Well, Primo certainly would've been happy."

* * *

><p>Tsuna and Reborn discussed his status as a mafia heir for another half hour before making a satisfying compromise. Tsuna agreed to take up the mantle, but Reborn would help him make changes and Tsuna would have equal priority in caring for Merith. Tsuna would not abandon his duties, even if he had a habit of escaping them for a short time. He was a prince first, mafia heir second…<p>

Now all he had to do was get the advice of his mother and grandfather to cement his decision.

* * *

><p>His mother agreed readily enough, like Reborn had known she would. They did not have a chance to meet the retired king until dinnertime, when the three royal members and the Vongola delegate came together to eat. All of them gathered in the large dining hall brightly lit by a line of chandeliers above the long table. The atmosphere was warm and inviting, made even more so by the artfully crafted dishes and enticing aromas.<p>

A few minutes after they started eating with small conversations, Tsuna broached the subject first. "Reborn approached me with a proposition earlier, and I have thought on it deeply with him. I have set conditions down, and Kaa-san agreed with my decision."

"What is this proposition you speak of, Tsunayoshi?" his grandfather questioned. He put down his fork and knife on his finished plate, allowing a servant to take it away and replace it with the second course.

"He told me that I am the heir to another… company," Tsuna tentatively said. "He says I'm the only one left." He took a gulp of water to cool his slightly frazzled nerves. Reborn showed no concern.

"A company? Well, if you think it's not too much trouble, I don't see why you can't accept. What is the company's name?"

"It's Vongola, your majesty," Reborn cut in.

"Ah! Our own business partners! That would be very beneficial. Then I strongly suggest you accept." The old man laughed jovially.

"But… it's not just a… business company," Tsuna hesitantly mumbled.

"What, then? Is it secretly a major mafia famiglia?" his grandfather jested. He laughed loudly at his own joke, but then noticed that no one else was responding. He looked uneasily at his family members and the Vongola delegate. They were all serious and grave.

The silence was deafening.

"You can't be serious," he gasped.

"Uh… so… what do you think? Ehehe…" Tsuna nervously laughed. His previous confidence that had been so strong back in the small private room a few hours ago had completely dissipated in the face of his grandfather. The old man, who was normally very buoyant, was uncharacteristically silent and still.

"You think I'm going to let you become a criminal?" his grandfather calmly asked.

* * *

><p>That night, Tsuna lay in his bed, staring at the full moon through the door to the balcony. <em>That didn't go over so well… <em>His grandfather had not agreed with Tsuna. At all. After a lengthy rant about crimes, reputation, and death, he finally quieted down some. He expressed that he would not allow his precious, innocent grandson to bloody his hands just because of the questionable words of a man he did not even know very well, having met said man only a handful of times during formal gatherings. Then he'd sent Tsuna into his room under lock, key, and a veritable mini-army of guards planning to keep him separated from Reborn until he left.

But Tsuna had already made up his mind. His mother had given him all the encouragement that he needed, and if he could make a large positive change in the world, he would brave his grandfather's anger and become a mafia boss.

So when Reborn silently snuck into his room sometime past midnight, Tsuna was ready and resolved.

"Plan B?"

"Plan B."

* * *

><p>Soot gremlins: little black puffballs from Spirited Away and My Neighbor Totoro (Studio Ghibli)<p>

I'm using characters from other series in place of OCs (I don't usually like OCs), so it's not a true crossover. They'll keep most of their original characteristics, but I'll be tweaking some so they fit the roles I need. They won't have a large focus either (this is a KHR fic).

Pairing suggestions? I tend toward slash. No cross pairings (i.e. Ichigo/Tsuna)… Or maybe gen.

And the typical question: if it ever comes to the point of having longer chapters or quicker updates, which is better?

Posted: 1/3/15


	3. Chapter 3

Tsuna had believed his grandfather would trust his judgment and support him like his mother. His vehement rejection surprised him. It had thrown off his original plans of getting his grandfather's blessings and help in implementing change within the mafia. But since his grandfather hadn't even allowed him to get another word in, he could see that no matter what he said or did he wouldn't get even half a step closer to his goal if he followed this route.

Therefore… plan B. He and Reborn had predicted possible outcomes and made plans to counter the more undesirable ones during their meeting, and Reborn even insisted on making backup plans for the backups, being the perfectionist that he was. The most glaringly obvious possibility was that his grandfather would oppose him. Even though he was a retired king, he still held a considerable amount of power and authority, especially since the royal duo of mother and son was not prepared to take all of the necessary duties. Little by little, more and more of the jobs would have been passed onto Tsuna, and perhaps he would've been able to fully take his position as king in another three years or so.

That pathway was already derailed, considering that Tsuna was not going to be staying in Merith. With plan B, Tsuna would be able to safely fulfill his duties as prince to-be-king and also train to be the next Vongola boss while residing in another country (since there was no way the retired king would allow such a thing to happen and would instead hinder them in every manner feasible should they stay).

Tsuna would carefully select proficient people to take some of his tasks and leave Merith with Reborn. Tsuna and Reborn would change the mafia from the inside, and after proving that the Vongola was not corrupt like the old king thought and he was capable in leading it, Tsuna would return. Hopefully the old man would be more accepting then. If not… they'll cross that bridge when they got there.

Basically, he would push his princely responsibilities onto trusted people while he went gallivanting with Reborn.

And if he had difficulties during the escape, such as being recognized… there was always contingency plan C—but Tsuna did not want to resort to that. Tsuna promised to himself he would only use it if he was desperate and there were no other choices. He wanted to avoid that one as much as possible…

* * *

><p>Surprisingly, the escape went off without a hitch, and thankfully contingency plan C was not necessary. He put his mother in charge of Division One, which was the commanding division of the army. On the off-chance that someone actually attempted an attack on Merith, she knew how to enlist the spirits' aid, and so not much planning was needed there. All spirit-related matters were passed onto her as well. Tsuna also asked her to keep the plan a secret from her father and to run interference to lower the chances of finding him. Nana cheerfully accepted the job and request.<p>

Tsuna passed off diplomacy tasks to his English teacher. He wasn't sure if he would accept, but Tsuna could at least trust that if he didn't, then it would be passed onto someone else equally capable. After all, besides being the head of a noble family, the British teen worked as the best detective in Merith. What Tsuna didn't know was that his English teacher had a shadier job as the regulator of the darker side of Merith's society. That particular piece of knowledge would not be known to him until the title of king was officially passed onto him. He was also the source of inspiration for contingency plan C…

Other smaller jobs were distributed by way of letters left in the doorjamb of the designated people's houses. Reborn was helpful in getting all of them delivered. There was no way Tsuna would have been able to do it all on his own (not that he even sent off a single one). For all his spontaneous ventures throughout Merith, he was not very athletic, and he hadn't started to learn dueling or any other fighting type, so the only physical prowess he had was speed and a little bit of above-average stamina. His grandfather wanted him to learn the kingly duties first; physical training was low priority since most royals chose to use the spiritual powers inherited from their ancestors. (And Tsuna was rather small; his grandfather didn't want him to get hurt while training, not that that would save Tsuna from Reborn's harsh training.)

With all preparations ready, Tsuna was all set to start the next phase of the plan. They had to sneak out of the castle and board a ship (unrecorded, of course. It wouldn't do to have their plan foiled from such a simple mistake as leaving a noticeable trail).

* * *

><p>Tsuna changed out of his imperial clothes and slipped on plain clothes he dug out of the back of his closet, hidden under several miscellaneous boxes. He'd had to hide them when his guards confiscated some of his commoner's clothes in an attempt to make finding him during his escapades easier; if he couldn't blend in, then they could pick him out much faster. Thankfully, Tsuna still had some hidden away that the guards couldn't find. The clothes from the afternoon were probably long gone.<p>

Everything proceeded smoothly. Skittering down the sakura tree (and giving thanks to the sprite that kept it protected from all attempts in uprooting it or cutting it in any way), Tsuna inconspicuously vacated his room, thankful that the night guards had fallen asleep. They must've been worn out from running and chasing him down yesterday afternoon. It seemed luck was on his side today; there were no hitches so far. Hopefully the streak would continue.

He shouldn't have jinxed himself. And such a stupid mistake, too…

* * *

><p>The ship that Reborn and he had selected for their purposes was a cargo ship with the numbers <em>8059<em> painted on the side that was set to leave sharply at six in the morning. The ship that Reborn had arrived in would stay until the one they were sneaking onto had left in case there was a need for a diversion. Suspicions would be cast on the Vongola ship while _8059_ carried its stowaways far from Merith.

Getting onto the ship wasn't a problem. They were quiet and easily slipped through the lax security with the aid of their diminutive sizes. The problem came after they "boarded". While Tsuna was staring at the workers shifting crates and machinery, absorbed in watching the process and oblivious to Reborn's attempts in getting Tsuna to hide, someone noticed them and approached them. Reborn kicked Tsuna's shin in frustration at his lack of attentiveness to background stimuli. He really needed to fix that.

* * *

><p>"Hey! What are you doing over here? We're about to leave the dock! Get off the ship if you don't want to be separated from your parents," a cargo loader shouted at them.<p>

_Damn. We were found. Then… plan L part two. Reborn is not going to like this…_

Reborn caught onto the gleam in his eyes and sighed inaudibly. _And here goes some more of my dignity._

Tsuna picked up Reborn, who proceeded to act like a sleepy infant, and turned teary eyes at the ship worker while subtly shifting his hood to ensure it covered his hair. "Please, sir, let us stay. Our mother recently died and our father remarried without consideration to our feelings. Our—our _stepmother_ has never been kind to us. She hurts us so much every day and—I just can't take it anymore! I don't want my dear brother to grow up repressed by that—that witch," he appealed with trembling lips and a thin stream of tears trickling down his cheeks. _I just messed up, didn't I? Oh well; it's a minor mistake. I can make up the back-story on my own._

_Idiot. Didn't I say that stepmother was too cliché? We agreed on abusive uncle! _Reborn shouted in his mind, although he showed nothing on his face.

The ship worker was alarmed at the sight of tears. "Hey, hey! There's no need to cry here. Calm down." When Tsuna sniffled and blinked away the (forced) tears, he visibly relaxed. "Now, where's your dad? Won't he worry about you?"

Tsuna shook his head forlornly. "He's only had his attention on his new wife. The woman says that soon he'll forget about us completely because she'll make a new family with him."

The man softened at the pity-story and stroked his chin in thought. "Is that so? Well, what were you going to do on this ship? You know we're going far away from Merith, right? You might never have a chance to come back."

"I don't want to stay here anymore. There are too many memories that link to our mother, and our stepmother is going to desecrate our memories of her if we stay in that place. She's already thrown away our late mother's favorite dishes, said they were too gaudy. Please, let us stay on the ship and take us away from here." Tsuna's voice wavered at the end, as if he was about to cry again.

"Alright, alright! Just don't cry anymore. This is probably illegal, you know…" Tsuna quavered, and the man hurriedly added, "But if you stay quiet and hidden, there shouldn't be any problems. Okay?"

Tsuna looked up at him with shiny, adoring eyes. "Thank you, kind sir!" Reborn waved a clenched fist at him, still acting the part of a baby.

The man flushed a bit before turning his head away. "S-so just go hide somewhere safe. We'll land in the Cape of Good Hope in about six days."

With that settled, the man left and Tsuna finally snuck into the lower levels of the ship. When they were securely hidden away, Tsuna let the tension drain out of his body and slumped against a wall. Reborn smacked him on the head with a Leon-fan. "Two mistakes within the space of five minutes on the ship. Really, did you think no one would see you standing in the middle of the deck? And we made contingency plans for a reason; stick to them." Then he sighed. "At least your acting skills are good."

* * *

><p>The ride to Italy was smooth. The cargo loader snuck them meals and Tsuna started his lessons. He learned to hide better and stay alert (Reborn was particularly vicious about that since Tsuna's inattentiveness led to them nearly being caught and sent off the ship and Reborn's humiliation in acting like a baby—not that the ship worker knew that, but still).<p>

On the way there, Reborn gave an in-depth lesson on flames. The sooner Tsuna learned about them, the better. The ship served as a good training field. Reborn had fun shooting at the little prince, who tried to evade both the flame-infused bullets and the ship's occupants. He was mostly successful—in the end he only had singed sleeves from trying to knock the bullets out of the air with a small wind current (needless to say, Reborn's flames were stronger and easily overpowered Tsuna's air manipulation, only managing to redirect them from their original target of Tsuna's shoulder). The ship workers stayed blissfully unaware of the hitman and his student, although the burn marks and holes in the walls of the ship confused them.

In turn, Tsuna told Reborn about his lineage along with several spiritual abilities that came out of it. One was the above-mentioned capability of controlling wind currents, which came from the first spirit to join into his family line, the Gale Fox. Tsuna did not know all of his inherited powers since spiritual blessings manifested differently in each person of his line, some skipping over several generations before becoming present again. His mother had the power to shift the earth, and from what he knew, he didn't. It was possible that the ability simply hadn't manifested in him yet, but Tsuna had a feeling he didn't have it.

* * *

><p>The ship's destination, the Cape of Good Hope, was at the very bottom of Africa, but it made several stops along the way. One such stop was Darwin, Australia, where they unloaded several crates of fruit. Reborn and Tsuna got off the ship there after saying a farewell to the helpful cargo loader.<p>

"So what are we doing here, Reborn?" Tsuna asked curiously. He thought they were going to take the ship all the way to Africa since Reborn never made remarks against it.

"What do you think we are doing, little prince? We're training." Reborn twirled his Leon-gun in the air before pointing it at Tsuna. "Be prepared. It won't be easy."

_Obviously_, Tsuna huffed to himself. Then he yelped and jumped to avoid a bullet aimed at his feet.

"I heard that," Reborn said.

_Of course you did._ Tsuna dodged another bullet.

"I suggest you stop snarking before I aim for real."

Tsuna wisely kept his mind clear. He kept it like that as they made their way deeper into the forested area of Australia.

* * *

><p>"Are those ostriches?"<p>

"No. They're emus."

"Well, what are we doing in the middle of a flock of emus?"

"Would you have questioned me if we were in a flock of ostriches?"

"Yes."

"Shut up."

* * *

><p>Reborn wanted to use the emus for mafia boss training.<p>

Oh dear.

* * *

><p>"So… how does this work?" Tsuna tentatively questioned from his place on the back of a large emu.<p>

Reborn turned to him from where he was perched—also on an emu. "My, you're full of questions today."

"Aren't I always?" Tsuna retorted.

Reborn shot at the feet of Tsuna's emu. It shrieked and ran while Tsuna attempted to regain control of it. "Didn't I tell you not to snark at me?"

* * *

><p>Eventually, the emu calmed down and Tsuna apologetically patted its head. "What is the point of this?"<p>

"You're learning how to lead an army," Reborn carelessly responded.

"…With emus."

"Yes."

"…"

* * *

><p>Apparently, they were going to cause the revival of the Great Emu War, with Tsuna as the commander.<p>

Tsuna still did not see the point of this. Reborn shot at his feet again.

Truthfully, Reborn just wanted to watch his student flail. There really was no purpose. After Reborn had his fun, they would move to their actual training location. At least it had the added bonus of throwing any trackers the old king might have sent off their trail.

* * *

><p>"Well, if I'm going to do this, then I'll do it well," Tsuna decided. "So… how do I control the emus?"<p>

Reborn polished his Leon-gun, not even looking at Tsuna. "Figure it out yourself," he told him.

Tsuna stared incredulously at him. "What? You're the one who told me to do this. Shouldn't you at least give me some help?"

"This is part of mafia training: finding solutions for impossible situations."

"If it's impossible, then it's not possible. That's what impossible means. You do realize that, right?"

"Wrong. In the mafia, the impossible is definitely possible."

"That doesn't make any sense!"

Reborn shook the green gun threateningly. "Be quiet, little prince."

* * *

><p>Tsuna made no progress in learning how to direct the emus to his wishes. Reborn berated him for failing to fulfill his lesson that day. Tsuna didn't know how knowing how to control emus would be useful to a mafia boss but didn't question it in fear of another "lesson".<p>

That night, when they made a campfire and settled around it, Tsuna cooked with ingredients he had purchased from a nearby village and hummed quietly. Reborn didn't know where he got the money, but he didn't ask either. Then he noticed something odd—the emus that had chosen to huddle around them were watching Tsuna attentively. He poked Tsuna's leg with a long stick to get his attention. "Tsuna."

"Hm?" Tsuna stopped stirring and humming and turned toward him. "What?"

"Didn't I tell you to pay attention to your surroundings?"

"I was. I didn't hear anything or anyone coming."

"Not that."

"Huh?" Tsuna didn't notice anything beyond ordinary, other than the emus that were still gathered around them. Actually, they were all looking at him rather intensely… "What's wrong with them?"

"Figure it out yourself."

"Again?"

"Is that a complaint I hear?"

Tsuna rapidly shook his head. "No." Then he turned his mind to what might have caused this phenomenon. Food… he had been handling food. He raised a carrot into the air, but the emus' eyes remained focused on him. None were tempted by the carrot. (Did they even eat carrots?) Then maybe… He tried humming a little and noted that it seemed to do the trick. The emus that had turned their heads away looked back at him. Some even stood up to get closer to him.

Tsuna continued to experiment with his voice. Certain pitches and notes made the emus move in coordinated motions. Peck, step forward, kick… After a combination of notes nearly made the emus run him over, Tsuna stopped singing and scrambled back.

"Hey, Reborn, I found out how to control the emus," Tsuna said unnecessarily.

Reborn watched his student, amused. "You dropped the carrots."

"Ah!"

* * *

><p>The discovery of his suggestive song voice was unexpected but welcome. Reborn could see that it would be very beneficial. If Tsuna could somehow use it undetected, meetings with other mafia bosses could be concluded easily with far less destructive consequences and end in Vongola's favor more frequently.<p>

* * *

><p>Tsuna spent the next week practicing control with his voice, learning which combinations caused what, and soon enough his disconnected hums became a smooth, coherent song (albeit without words).<p>

On the day of the unofficially unannounced war, Tsuna was garbed in black and gray clothes with feathers lining the hood that was pulled over his head. "His" emu had a tasseled harness with stirrups so that Tsuna could stay on it without falling off. Learning to ride it was a trial and error process, since neither Reborn nor Tsuna had ever tried riding a large bird before. Reborn sat ready in a bird costume on his own emu with Leon transformed into a saddle.

"Are you ready, Tsuna?"

"No. I will never be ready," Tsuna mumbled.

Reborn acted as if he responded in the affirmative and replied, "Good. Let's go."

Tsuna sighed heavily before letting out a few trills to get the emu army to start moving.

* * *

><p>Like in the previous Emu War, the emus won, but this time they regained some of their territory (and it was against farmers, not the military). Reborn deemed it an acceptable victory.<p>

Tsuna was happy that it ended. Although he liked the emus, it was far too odd of an experience for him to endure for an extended period of time.

They boarded a cruise ship under aliases, again with Tsuna's money. They would arrive in Japan in about two weeks.

* * *

><p>The cruise ship docked at Osaka fifteen days later. Tsuna got them onto the rail system, which would drop them into their destination in another hour.<p>

And Reborn still didn't know where the money came from.

* * *

><p>The old king found out about Tsuna's escape the morning he left. The maid that was sent to fetch him for breakfast had been unable to find him and reported it to the old man. At first, he thought Tsuna was only sulking and gone into one of the districts, but when none of the guards were able to find him five hours later and someone notified him that Reborn was gone as well, he correctly deduced that they had fled.<p>

He sighed tiredly. Didn't Tsuna realize that being a mafia boss is dangerous, both for him and the country? If Tsuna died, there would be no one left to take the throne, and the country would fall apart. His daughter could extend the country's life for a few more decades, but there would be an inevitable doom since there were no heirs after her. He knew that she would refuse to have another child just for the purpose of the throne, and she would be heartbroken over the loss of her dear son. As a prince, Tsuna had to put the country before himself.

He also wouldn't be able to take the pain of the death of another family member. His wife had died decades before because her guards had been inattentive the day she had gone out to the first northern district. When her guards fell behind, a common robber threatened her, thinking she was a rich housewife, and had slit her throat when she told him she had no money on her. And she hadn't; one of the guards had been carrying her things for her. The guards arrived too late, only managing to witness the murder of the queen. He executed the guards and the robber in grief. His son was cocky and challenged a dragon spirit into a duel in an attempt to impress a dame. He knew his son should have known better than to do something so stupid, so he couldn't fault the spirit. He sent an apology to the dragon and buried the remains of his son—what pieces he could retrieve, anyway.

When he learned that his daughter had a son, he was delighted. When he finally met his grandson, he was overjoyed. The child was small and cute, absolutely adorable. He happily watched his grandson grow into a regal little prince, yet he still held a childish innocence. He was a bit petite for his age, but that didn't matter to him. Tsuna was fair and kind, good traits for the future king.

Then that Vongola delegate came and told Tsuna that he was to inherit the title of mafia boss. He had experience with those kinds of people. A new famiglia tried to make its base in Merith under the pretense of being a technology-based company. They were swiftly taken care of, but not before they extorted some of the surrounding citizens of their money.

He was going to have to call a meeting with Vongola, this time without the façade of a trading company but as a mafia group. He would negotiate with them to exclude Tsuna in their affairs, to spare him from the bloody side of the world. If it didn't end favorably, then he could always forcefully _persuade_ them. Normal people can't fight against spirits very well; even his late son had trouble with them, and he had been trained to deal with them in case a meeting with a spirit ever went wrong. (And a dragon was definitely out of the question. They were ridiculously hardy and resistant to attacks, especially in full dragon form.) But the old king didn't know about Flames, and if a war ever was to break out, then there would be many more complications than he thought.

In the meanwhile, he set his best detective to find Tsuna. Young though he was, the British boy excelled in his job. An added bonus was that he was Tsuna's English teacher, so he knew Tsuna's habits very well. Tsuna will have difficulties in evading him.

* * *

><p>You can probably guess who the English teacherdetective is… at least if you're familiar with the anime he is from. Can you guess what plan C is? There's a clue in his character, but maybe it's too vague. For people curious about plan C, it may come back in the future (maybe not, depending on how the plot develops in my head).

The Great Emu War really happened.

I think I'll try to aim for a weekly update with at least 5k words, at least when I'm not dying from schoolwork (four hard AP classes… are killing me). Acceptable?

Regarding pairings: maybe All27 with hints toward specific pairings. I'm not sure yet. It could just end up gen if I never get into romance.

Guardians are coming soon...

Hibari, Fon, and Alaude share the same voice actor, who also voices for Onodera Ritsu (Sekaiichi Hatsukoi). Cannot comprehend. They sound so different.

Posted: 1/5/15


	4. Chapter 4

_On the day Tsuna left:_

A gilded envelope lay on the tray next to a cup of Earl Grey tea and prawn curry. After eating his breakfast, the young master picked up the letter opener and slit the envelope. A delicate hand with a large sapphire ring on the thumb slipped the letter inside of it out and unfolded the decorative paper. Blue eyes roamed over the cursive words, quickly picking up the important details.

"The king has given us a new mission. We are to locate the missing prince. Prepare the ship. We'll leave in the afternoon," a youthful voice rang out.

His butler bowed with a gloved hand over his heart. "Yes, my lord."

* * *

><p>Tsuna and Reborn got off the railway at Namimori, Tsuna's first home which he hadn't seen in seven years. He remembered the sunny afternoons in the park, baking in the cozy kitchen with his mother, the bullies at school… He grimaced. That was not worth remembering.<p>

Reborn selected Namimori because Tsuna was familiar with the layout of the town. If there was ever a need to flee, then Tsuna would be able to navigate through the streets without getting lost. Reborn had also familiarized himself months ago because of his initial mission in training Tsuna. There was no need to worry about being caught for a while since Nana was sure to have erased information about Tsuna's early background.

Tsuna slung his knapsack over his shoulder. All that was in there were the only things he had brought. Any bag larger would've hindered his mobility, and he figured that anything he needed he could buy. All his prized possessions would be safe back at the castle; he didn't need to worry about them being stolen or thrown out, so there was no need to bring them with him. Currently he had four changes of clothes, his crown, his wallet, and some leftover food. (He had to take the crown since he accepted the title of prince. Leaving it behind would mean he was abandoning his claim.)

Reborn finally decided to indulge his curiosity and asked where he hid his money; the wallet didn't look that big and couldn't possibly have held the amount of money Tsuna had spent, and from what he knew, Merith didn't implement the use of credit cards. Tsuna just smiled mysteriously at him and refused to say anything.

Reborn stomped on his foot. Tsuna jumped in pain.

* * *

><p>They stood in front of the Sawada residence.<p>

"Wow… the house is very… dirty," Tsuna said.

Reborn scoffed. "It's filthy. Now clean it up. I refuse to live in these conditions."

"Or I could just call a cleaning service," Tsuna suggested.

"And how will you do that without a phone?"

"…I'll go buy one."

* * *

><p>Ciel Phantomhive was an orphaned child who lost his parents when he was ten in a supposedly accidental fire, but Ciel knew it had purposely been started to kill off the Phantomhive family. He made it his personal mission to find out who caused it and get revenge.<p>

Ciel was given sanctuary in his Cousin Elizabeth's mansion while his own was being rebuilt. On a cloudy night, Sebastian appeared to him in the form of a three-legged crow, more commonly called Yatagarasu in Japanese folklore, but Ciel hadn't known that at the time and merely thought him to be a mutated crow. He sat on the windowsill of Ciel's room, watching him silently. Ciel thought nothing of it and went to sleep, but the next morning he was still there. He followed him everywhere, going from window to window to keep Ciel in his line of sight. Then when Ciel started taking up cases like his father had, the crow trailed him into town, the countryside, the government buildings—he didn't leave him alone.

And when Ciel put together the clues and discovered his parents' killers—the British parliament, which had wanted to remove all traces of government involvement in crime, such as using the Phantomhives to hide the government's "dirty laundry"—the crow granted his wish. Yatagarasu took human form, a tall red-eyed man, and killed the guilty party. Sebastian never explained why he chose to follow Ciel, but that day, in the blood-soaked chamber, he vowed to serve him until he died.

All traces of Ciel having been there were erased by Sebastian, even the still-warm corpses. There was much speculation on what had happened to them, such as being abducted by aliens (one Gokudera Hayato was very excited about this particular theory), but no one ever found out what truly happened. After all, Sebastian was _one hell of a butler_, and _what kind of Phantomhive servant would he be if he couldn't hide the corpses of his master's fallen enemies_?

After seeing how corrupt and rotten Britain's government was, Ciel had no wishes in working under it any longer, even though the corrupt Parliament members were inevitably replaced. He expressed his desire in leaving England, so Sebastian suggested he go to Merith, his own home. Finding no problems with the idea, he accepted. They liquidated all of the Phantomhive's assets and moved to Merith.

Now, at fourteen years old, he worked as a detective, the private English teacher to the prince of Merith, the head of the Phantomhive family (diminished though it was), and the "Underworld Prince". The last title was not an official name, but that was what the shadier side of society called him since he was the controlling force in the less-than-legal affairs of the country. In addition, he acted quite like a regal, noble prince and had considerable wealth from his inheritance and his own earnings.

* * *

><p><em>On the day Tsuna left:<em>

Ciel sat in his private room in the ship, reading over the given information about the runaway prince. He read through the files several times, picking up on discrepancies and missing information. Someone had edited them… They mentioned that Tsuna used to live in another country for the first seven years of his life, but didn't note that country's name. It also omitted Tsuna's original last name, which was now his middle name. Ciel sighed in frustration. This was no help; he already knew the information that was written. Everything he needed was gone for some reason, so he had no idea about the likely places he could be.

He would have to take the longer route of manual tracking. He looked at the list of ships that had left earlier that day. The list of possible ships was thankfully shortened by the time frame. Only three were suspect—two cargo ships and a luxury cruise ship. He did not even consider the Vongola ship that left in the same time frame, knowing that it would have been left as a diversion. One of the cargo ships left at five in the morning, the next left an hour later, and the cruise ship left at eight. The maid usually woke him at 7:30, so the cruise ship would've been very risky. The prince knew she would've reported his disappearance, and if the docks were closed down, then escape would've been impossible as the ships were the only mode of transport in and out of the country. (The dragon and griffin spirits perceived planes to be a challenge to their authority in the skies, so they were always forcefully knocked out of the air, bringing danger to the passengers and the people below.)

Then the prince took one of the cargo ships. One went to Italy, the other to Africa. The one going to Italy would make more sense (as it was going straight to the mafia heartland), but maybe he actually took the other ship, hoping that the Italy-bound ship acted as a distraction… Or maybe he was using reverse psychology in making him think like that and he actually really did take the ship to Italy…

"Yo, Ciel, where are you?" Prince Tsuna's personal guard shouted out.

Ciel glared subtly at the closed door, which was bound to burst open any second. "And why did we bring him again?"

Sebastian placed the chiffon cake in front of Ciel. "The king recommended it."

Ciel closed his eyes and lightly picked up the fork. "We should have declined." He stabbed the cake in a swift motion. The taste of rich chocolate and cream enticed a pleased purr from his throat, which did not go unnoticed by the butler.

_Oh? It seems the young master is finally starting to show his hidden characteristics. A little late, but trauma does tend to hinder growth._

As predicted, the door slammed open. Ichigo stepped in. "Oh, so you were here. You could have told me. Do you know how many door I opened while looking for you?"

Cutting off his rant, Ciel asked, "And what is it you needed?"

Ichigo placed his hands behind his head and looked up as if in thought. "Huh… I forgot."

Ciel clenched his hands into fists, bending the fork still in his hand.

Sebastian regarded the bent silverware with slight concern. "Young master… perhaps it is time for a break."

* * *

><p>Tsuna walked slowly between the display cases, perusing the cell phones and considering the merits of each. He was aiming to blend in with the kids his age, so it couldn't be extravagant, but he wanted something with good quality, something that wouldn't break so easily.<p>

"What takes so long, little prince?" Reborn, who was walking behind him, asked. "Just choose one already. If you're worried about losing or breaking it, you can just buy a new one later."

"I think it'd be better if I just bought a good one now so I won't have to keep running into the phone store every time it breaks," Tsuna murmured. Finally he decided on a sleek black phone reputed to be able to withstand nearly any accident and had other features that fit his needs. He also picked out a durable orange case and a cute chameleon phone charm. When Reborn looked at him questioningly, Tsuna chose not to answer.

Reborn kicked his leg. Tsuna dropped his newly bought phone.

_At least I now know it can survive falls_, Tsuna noted after picking up and inspecting his phone, unable to find a single scratch. He attached the ornament to the phone. Its orange eyes gleamed at him.

* * *

><p>Tsuna called a housecleaning service whose ad was posted on the city bulletin. He checked the interior of his thinning wallet and huffed. He was going to need more money to pay for the whole house to be cleaned. The money he had withdrawn during their stay in Australia was not going to last for long.<p>

"Hey, Reborn, I need to make a stop at the bank."

"You're not going to use your prince's account, are you? They'll easily be able to trace us here if you do."

"I know that, Reborn. I haven't been using that account ever since I left Merith."

"So you're finally going to tell me where all your money comes from?"

"Maybe~" Tsuna hummed playfully.

Reborn looked into Tsuna's eyes. "Acting coy does not endear you to me."

Tsuna flushed and hurriedly yelled, "I wasn't trying to!"

* * *

><p>Tsuna withdrew some money from an account under the name of Vin Jameson. He caught Reborn's eye and answered the question that lingered there.<p>

"I made a couple personas within Merith's main wine company in case this ever happened."

"You anticipated being called to become a mafia boss and running to Japan for temporary asylum?" Reborn sarcastically asked.

Tsuna covered his mouth and laughed sheepishly. "Uh… I might've been planning to take a vacation in a foreign country back when I was still in Merith. I hadn't chosen my destination yet, so I made several bank accounts in a variety of locations to give myself some prepared choices and just in case one was discovered."

_He would go that far to take a break from work? I'll have to beat a stronger work ethic into him…_

Tsuna noticed Reborn's rather frightening expression and nervously asked, "Huh? Reborn? Why are you looking at me like that?"

Reborn smirked with questionable glee. "Nothing."

_He's lying_, a voice whispered in Tsuna's mind.

Reborn deciphered Tsuna's agitated movements and deduced his thoughts. _His Hyper Intuition is making an appearance._ "Problem, little prince?"

Tsuna hastily shook his head.

* * *

><p>After the housecleaners returned the house to its former inhabitable state, Tsuna paid a considerable bill and gave them a hefty tip. Seven years of dust and grime was a lot of work to remove, after all. Some of the furniture was beyond saving, however. It seemed a family of mice found the couch to be a suitable burrow, and an eclipse of moths tore open most of the fabric. The mattresses, futons, and clothes had to be replaced as well. At the same time, they bought food to fill the emptied refrigerator and pantry.<p>

The seven-years-old note that still lay unread was put away in a compartment of his parents' nightstand. He wanted to keep it so that his father—if he ever came home, which seemed doubtful at this point—could read it. It was the way he wanted his father to learn about his mother's side of his lineage. If he never came back and found the note in that small drawer, then he would never know, and Tsuna would never tell him. It was petty vindication, Tsuna knew, but he wanted at least that—to have the man read his wife's words years too late rather than never. Maybe if he did, then guilt would settle in and he would keep in contact with his mother more. Tsuna was not oblivious to his mother's forlorn sighs as she looked at the ridiculous wedding picture on their anniversary.

Tsuna reclaimed his room, not wanting to intrude on his parents' room even though they weren't there, or even likely to come by anytime soon. Reborn set up a hammock near Tsuna's bed instead of taking one of the empty guest rooms.

* * *

><p>"Say, Reborn, do you know how to cook?" Tsuna idly queried as he put away the groceries.<p>

Reborn took a sip of his espresso that he made himself earlier. "And why do you need to know something like that?"

Tsuna worriedly looked at Reborn, who was still uncaringly sitting against the wall on the kitchen counter. "If you don't, then we're in a bit of trouble. Other than helping Kaa-san in the kitchen when I was younger, I have no experience in cooking. I never needed to learn how since it was the chefs' job at the castle."

Reborn stirred his coffee around, still not making eye contact with Tsuna. "And now you have a reason to."

"What? Why don't _you_ learn?" Tsuna shot back. He stepped back when Reborn's Leon-gun glinted dangerously in his direction.

Reborn's fedora covered his eyes darkly. "I do hope you are not complaining. Are you?"

Tsuna learned to keep his complaints to himself that afternoon (although Reborn could still predict what he thought, as long as he did not voice it out Reborn did not attack and he was safe).

* * *

><p>Tsuna was taking a break from all of the strenuous exertion. He hadn't done something like that in a long while. The only situation close to that was when he happily accepted free fresh fruit from the marketplace vendors in Merith, but the load was a lot lighter then.<p>

Today he carried ten bags of groceries, and Reborn didn't offer to take a single one. He walked strain-free next to Tsuna, watching as his student struggled to keep a hold of all of the bags. A mother surrounded by four kids passed them, carrying twice the load that Tsuna had and giving a passing glance at the duo curiously.

"How do… normal people do this… so frequently?" Tsuna gasped out.

"Royal life has been detrimental to your physical state. You're pathetically weak right now," Reborn reflected. It was actually rather pitiful watching the small teen strain under the groceries. It wasn't like they were particularly heavy either. Reborn continued walking at the same pace, disregarding Tsuna's slowing footsteps.

Tsuna put down the bags to take a breath. After getting control of his lungs back, he responded, "Getting control over the supernatural powers that I discovered was more important. If a meeting with a spirit ever went wrong, that was what I would've needed. Besides, Grandfather didn't want me to start physical training until I was bigger."

_From what I can see, you won't be getting very tall, and the old king probably knew that, too._ "Well you're going to need it in the mafia life. We'll start training soon." Cue another sadistic grin.

Tsuna didn't see it this time as he was still desperately trying to regain normal amounts of oxygen in his body, but he did feel a dreadful apprehensiveness. _Why do I feel like a pack of hellhounds are about to chase me?_

* * *

><p>"Now, we're going to assimilate into the general populace to make being found harder, so you'll have to act your age and do what every other kid does—go to school. Do you have a preference in schools? Namimori is closest, but if you want to make being found harder, we can use plan C part one and have you go to Midori—"<p>

Tsuna's early school life flashed in his mind. He shook the memories out and blocked them. "Can't we just say that I'm being homeschooled? I already know the material anyways." He didn't want to experience bullying again; a year of it was enough—actually, he never wanted to go through it in the first place.

Reborn immediately rejected the suggestion. "No. That'll make you stand out. Most kids here attend a public school, and you are supposed to be a common child."

Tsuna knew it was coming; he was just denying it for as long as he could. He was going to go back into a public school, where other kids had little respect for other people, and even worse was that it was the stage in which hormones started to make an appearance. Tsuna shuddered, aghast at the thought.

Reborn frowned. "Is there something you want to tell me, little prince?"

Tsuna shook his head and got up from the couch. "No. Do what you want."

So nonchalant about school? Fine. He would. Then maybe he would take education seriously… even if he already learned those course levels. Hey, it was the concept that mattered.

* * *

><p>They weren't hellhounds, but they were pretty close—at least in Tsuna's opinion.<p>

Reborn had rounded up every stray dog he could find—and even snuck some out of the local pound—to give _motivation_ to Tsuna as he ran laps around the perimeter of Namimori. With a blood-dripping steak attached to his jacket.

Wonderful.

Nearby people looked up from what they were doing at the sound of the panicked gasps of a young boy. They curiously watched the aforementioned boy tear down the street, and then quickly got out of the way of a baying pack of miscellaneous dogs that followed.

Reborn noted that Tsuna's speed was at a good level, and his stamina was higher than he expected. He just had to work on his muscle strength… and possibly coordination, Reborn considered as Tsuna nearly ran into a streetlight, just barely managing to swerve away at the last moment. Oh… and background awareness has gotten better. Tsuna sharply turned to avoid the jump of a dog that had gotten close.

Tsuna was beginning to slow down. It was enough training for the first day, so Reborn left to rescue his student from the pack of dogs.

* * *

><p>Reborn was filling in Tsuna's forms for Namimori Middle. Most of it was simple—name, age, birthday—but some he had to get creative with.<p>

Name of guardian… Bianchi. Nana wasn't here to cover for Tsuna, so she couldn't be listed as guardian. Bianchi would be here soon along with her brother, who Reborn planned to make into Tsuna's Storm Guardian. She was the only legal adult that would be in the household, so really she was the only viable choice. Tsuna probably wouldn't mind the tweak in his guardianship, but if he did… Reborn had a way to change his mind. Forcefully.

Emergency contact… He wrote in Bianchi's information. Not much to do there.

Allergies… From what he observed, Tsuna didn't have any allergies, but just for fun, he wrote in cucumbers. And maybe a couple more.

Health problems… Well, Tsuna didn't carry around a pill case, so he likely didn't have anything serious, if any. He wrote "None".

Reborn knew he could just tell Tsuna to do it, but the little prince was just so _tired_ from all that running today and needed his rest…

Actually, Reborn just wanted to mess with the school, even if it was in such a minor way. Besides, it wasn't going to hurt anyone, right? And Tsuna _did_ say to do whatever he wanted… He should be thankful he was not applying him for Midori.

* * *

><p>Ciel decided that they would investigate all of the possible places that the two cargo ships docked in. So far, they searched three cities and their surrounding areas, but there were no signs of the prince.<p>

Ciel and Sebastian were in Darwin, Australia, one of the places that _8059_ stopped at. Surprisingly, the moment they got off, they met face to face with an emu. Sebastian picked Ciel up and batted the bird away. It screeched and attempted a peck before fleeing.

"Why are there so many ostriches in this city?" Ciel asked, irritated.

"They are emus, young master," Sebastian corrected. "I do believe this is not a normal state for this town. The last I heard about Australia, the emus lived deeper in."

Their conversation caught the attention of some of the people that had been standing nearby. "Indeed, that was true until two weeks ago," a local who had been listening in told him.

Ciel motioned to Sebastian to let him down. Once he had both feet on the ground, he faced the local and inquired, "What do you mean?"

"Oh, the emus made a comeback and restarted the Emu War, but this time with an organized force. They had someone leading them—sat on an emu and directed them. It's the oddest thing I ever witnessed. The emus even won the bloody war again!"

"And who was this person?" Sebastian queried.

"We don't know who specifically, but we call him the Mob Lord. That's his emu over there."

The emu he pointed out had a fancy tasseled harness and a feathery crown on its head. The emus around it had their heads lowered to it. It trilled, pleased at their deference.

Ciel immediately knew it was the prince that was the so-called Mob Lord. He had a tendency to do strange and random things and it was much too coincidental that this would happen in an area the prince might've been at. Still, this was the first time that he led an animal army. The title was also oddly fitting seeing as how the prince was striving to become a mafia boss.

…It seemed the prince was going through an unusual phase of his life. Hopefully it would be over soon.

Sebastian hummed in thought. "Does this count as his first successful military venture?"

"I'll have to ask the king. Come, Sebastian. We'll ask around for more information about where he might've gone."

"Yes, my lord."

* * *

><p>The doorbell rang. Tsuna instantly raised his head from the couch on which he had been recuperating. "There's no way they could've found us this quickly, could they?"<p>

"Of course not. I hid our tracks fairly well. It will take them much more time than that to find us," Reborn replied confidently. "I believe we have some guests. Go get the door," he added when Tsuna didn't move.

"Sure, sure." With trembling, exhausted limbs, Tsuna painfully got off the couch and shuffled to the door. He undid the locks and pulled the door open. Two people stood before him—actually, one was being carried by the other.

The woman with light pink adjusted the boy on her back before she announced, "I'm here to see my beloved, Reborn."

* * *

><p>Cell phone is two words. A group of emus is called a mob. How convenient for me.<p>

One guest reviewer guessed the identity of the English teacher/detective. The Crossover Addict and guest reviewer yukari guessed plan C. Good job. Wow. I guess very few people watch/read Kuroshitsuji anymore. I haven't read/watched Detective Conan, although I might watch Magic Kaito at some point. Edit: I tried to watch the first episode, but their noses… and the voice of the main character… and why has that girl not filed for sexual harassment yet?

Sorry to the British people. I needed to substitute the evil queen from Kuroshitsuji with the modern day governing body. I mean no offense.

Byakuya/Ichigo is not possible. He's married to Hisana, so sorry.

This will never have a lemon in it. Or a lime. Or whatever else citrus fruit.

This story will not reach the point of Tsuna choosing a permanent partner and having a child, so let's not worry about that… I'm leaving it open-ended regarding that matter. The story's not going to be heavy on romance—very little attention on it, actually.

The weekly posting schedule will be effective… soon. School restarts on Monday (and I haven't done my Winter Break work). _Despair._

My chapters are closer to 4k words than 5k like I said… Eh.

Posted: 1/9/15


	5. Chapter 5

"Please come in." Tsuna stepped aside to let the woman inside.

"Thank you," she returned politely. She slid off her own shoes, pulled off the unconscious person's shoes, and walked further inside the house.

Tsuna shut the door quietly after her. He worriedly looked at the comatose person she carried. "Is he okay?" The person moaned indistinctly.

"Probably. He gets like this whenever he sees me," the woman replied as if such a situation was normal.

Tsuna decided not to question further for now. "You can lay him on the couch," he directed. She dropped him onto the cushions, and Tsuna positioned him to be more comfortable. He fetched a bowl of cool water and a cloth to wet and place on his head.

Meanwhile, the guest approached the tiny hitman. "Reborn, I've missed you," she greeted happily.

"It's good to see you too, Bianchi."

"So what did you need me for, Reborn?" She leaned in closer to him, letting her hair fall over her shoulder seductively.

Completely ignoring the display, Reborn turned to the direction of his student, who was fretting over the still-unconscious boy. "I want you to take care of him—train him, protect him. And you can't kill him, or we'll have a major political issue on our hands. I don't want to deal with that."

"_That's_ what you care about?" Tsuna mumbled, able to hear the not-so-private conversation.

There was a pained moan that indicated the silver-haired teen was waking up. The wet cloth that had been covering his forehead fell off as he gradually lifted himself up from his prostrate position on the couch. He blinked slowly to clear his vision, but the fuzziness disappeared instantly when he saw who sat in front of him.

"What is Prince Tsunayoshi la Alsveith doing here?" Then he noticed the small shadow lurking in the background. "And with the world's greatest hitman?"

"Hayato, you know him?" his sister asked, surprised. Reborn looked interested as well, jumping onto the back of the couch to get closer.

Gokudera was careful not to look at Bianchi, hoping to keep his fragile stomach from failing again. "Yes. Prince Tsunayoshi helped me when I was wounded during a botched assassination in Merith. He took me to the castle and had me healed and fed." Then his eyes turned scarily bright. "When I was depressed about my failure, he told me that it was okay I made a mistake and I would find a place to belong eventually, that I didn't have to force myself to try and fit other people's expectations."

He turned his sparkling eyes to the prince. "It must be fate that we met again."

Reborn knew how to turn an unexpected situation into a favorable one, and if he played his cards right… "Of course," Reborn agreed easily. "After all, you were called here to test the Vongola Decimo candidate and it turns out to be your savior."

"Vongola Decimo? He is definitely worthy!" Gokudera faced the shocked prince and bowed lowly—as much as he could while still on the couch, anyway. "Please, if it would please you, let me be your Storm Guardian!"

"A-ah. Okay…?" Tsuna stuttered unsurely. He was still a bit surprised that the previous sickly person could spring back so quickly from near-death.

"That was easy," Reborn contemplated. Then he addressed the new Guardian. "You're his first recruit, so you'll have to guide him in some areas. He still doesn't know about the jobs of the Guardians."

"I accept, Reborn-san. I will help him however it is possible!"

Tsuna was stunned by the sheer enthusiasm that Gokudera exuded. He could feel it coming off him in waves. "That's nice, Gokudera-kun. But for now, you should have some rest." He still worried about his abrupt recovery; that wasn't possible, was it?

"The prince is so caring," Gokudera whispered wondrously at the amount of concern he showed him.

"Let's go have some tea," Reborn suggested to Bianchi. The duo left the two teens to get the unexpected reunion out of their system and settled their relationship dynamics. Tsuna still tried to convince the silver-haired teen to lie back down while Gokudera adamantly (and gently) refused and insisted the prince sit down on the couch instead. It would take a while, it seemed. A very long while.

* * *

><p>The Poison Scorpion and the Sun Arcobaleno took seats at the dining room table with new cups of tea.<p>

Bianchi started to speak first. "So… the prince of a far-off country. This is unusual for you, Reborn."

Reborn took a sip of the still-hot tea, watching the steam rise in elegant streams. "It was unexpected. He was supposed to be a below-average middle-school student, from what his father's information told me. As you can see, he was very wrong." Here he smirked.

Bianchi blinked in surprise. "His own father didn't know something like this? Who is he?" _What idiot doesn't even know what is happening within their own family, especially something so big?_

"Iemitsu Sawada, the CEDEF leader," Reborn revealed.

* * *

><p>"Are you okay, my prince? You look very tired. Please, take a seat!" Gokudera motioned to the couch again, stubbornly adamant in making Tsuna sit down.<p>

Finally tiring of the argument, Tsuna gave in, but forced the other teen to do the same. Then he recalled what he called him. "Ah, Gokudera-kun, you can't call me that. I'm currently undercover."

Gokudera sat up straighter, more alert than he was a second ago. "Why? Are you in trouble? Don't worry, I'll protect you!"

Tsuna immediately dissuaded the notion. "No, no. It's not like that. The previous king, my grandfather, disagreed with my decision in taking up the Vongola Decimo title, so I had to leave."

"He disowned you?" Gokudera asked, shocked at the information.

Tsuna hurriedly corrected himself. "No! He actually tried to trap me in the castle to make sure I wouldn't disappear, but I got out anyway. I left of my own choice so that I could become the Vongola boss and change the mafia. Reborn told me that the original goal of the famiglia was to protect the innocent, and I want to restore it as it originally was."

Gokudera calmed at that. "That is a noble goal, but it will be difficult. The Vongola famiglia is a true mafia group, not the vigilantes that it once was. It won't be as easy as you make it sound."

Tsuna dragged a hand through his ruffled hair, sweeping some out of his face. He replied with resolution in his voice, "I know it will be a long journey, but I want to make it. I will take this path. You won't stop me, will you?"

"I wasn't trying to discourage you. Actually, I would be honored if you allowed me to undertake this task with you. Please let me help you, my prince." Gokudera bowed, again with an awkward stance because he was still seated.

"Thank you very much, Gokudera-kun." Tsuna smiled vibrantly. "But you still can't call me that."

* * *

><p>Gokudera and Tsuna settled for Tsuna-sama. Gokudera wouldn't accept a more familiar honorific and it was the only address that had Tsuna's first name in it that he would. It was better than –ouji and –denka, anyways.<p>

* * *

><p>It was nearing nighttime and they needed to start making dinner or they would have to go out to eat again. Tsuna decided now would be a good time to start learning.<p>

"Can either of you help me cook?" Tsuna asked the two siblings.

"You can't ask my sister. She has the moniker Poison Scorpion for a reason."

"In that case, will you help me, Gokudera-kun?"

"Of course, Tsuna-sama."

Both of them entered the kitchen to start making dinner. Tsuna knew it wouldn't end up perfect, but he hoped not to mess it up too much.

Bianchi scoffed softly and intoned, "I wouldn't be so eager to invite him into the kitchen. I might be the Poison Scorpion, but he's the Smoking Bomb."

Reborn looked at Bianchi from the corner of his eyes. He still faced the kitchen doorway that Gokudera and Tsuna disappeared through. "So you mean…"

Bianchi nodded and continued, "I have my poison cooking, and Hayato has—"

_Fwoosh._

The kitchen caught fire. Gokudera was pushed out of the kitchen and Tsuna frantically tried to put out the eggs, which had an unnaturally large fire feeding on it.

"—dynamite cooking."

Bianchi walked to her brother and patted his shoulder. "See, Hayato? What did I tell you? You have no talents in the kitchen."

"I don't want to hear that from you," the Storm Guardian gritted out, depressed and disappointed at not being able to help the prince in doing such a menial job.

* * *

><p>Dinner ended up being decent, despite it being Tsuna's first attempts at cooking a meal.<p>

Gokudera was exuberant and heavy with praise. "This was made so well, Tsuna-sama!"

"Not bad," Bianchi gave.

Of course, Reborn was not one to hand out compliments so easily. "I expect it to be twice as better next time, Tsuna."

* * *

><p>Bianchi and Gokudera each took one of the three guest rooms available. Gokudera had wanted to room with Tsuna to keep a better watch on him and provide better protection, but Tsuna turned him down. If there ever was a security problem, Reborn was right there. Anyways, there really was no space in his room other than the closet, but no one was insane enough to sleep there. (Gokudera tried; Tsuna pushed him out.)<p>

* * *

><p>The next day was spent getting ready for school. Another packet of forms was retrieved for Gokudera and the both of them went into the shopping district to buy supplies. While there, Tsuna went into the bookstore to buy some recipe books. His mother had taken all her favorites when they went to Merith, and the ones left over were a bit odd. Really, what was a Broccoli Chicken Fettuccini Alfredo? He never recalled his mother making something like that. It distinctly didn't seem even remotely Japanese.<p>

Overall, their shopping amounted to four bags' worth of items bought with money from Tsuna's Vin Jameson account. Feeling guilty for having the prince pay for him, Gokudera offered to carry all of the bags, but Tsuna insisted it was fine and took a bag (Gokudera wouldn't let him carry two).

On the way home, they took a different path out from the shopping district than the way they came in. Although it had been seven years since Tsuna was in Namimori, he still hadn't forgotten his hometown's structure, so they didn't get lost, but while they were slowly making their way toward home, he picked out an out-of-place building he couldn't quite recall from his memories. Was it always there? It wasn't built recently; it seemed very old, what with some discolored roof tiles and faded wood. Maybe his memories weren't as good as he thought and he's simply forgotten about it.

Out of curiosity, Tsuna meandered toward it, and Gokudera followed when he noticed his boss straying from the path home. Urahara Shoten, the sign announced. The building was small, a traditional Japanese building with two floors and a beat-up van next to it. The lot in front was fairly spacious but barren.

The prince and the Storm Guardian walked the rest of the way into the shop, sliding the doors open and peering in. There were a few stands of candy lining the room and creating short aisles. Despite the building looking quite void and abandoned, the candy looked new and fresh. Tsuna approached a large jar on one of the stands near the back. The candy inside was spherical and green.

Tsuna jolted when a voice suddenly called out, "Oh? Are you interested in those? I do believe they won't fit your tastes, at least not yet."

Tsuna turned around quickly, Gokudera behind him already prepared to defend him with a handful of dynamites and hurriedly stepping in front.

There was a man. A tall blond man wearing predominantly green clothes, a green-and-white striped bucket hat, and geta was in the doorway of the backroom while eating a large pink swirled lollipop. He grinned at them. "There's no use for weapons in here, so you may as well put them away."

Gokudera growled. "And how do we know you're not a threat? I didn't hear you coming at all."

The odd man laughed. "How could a tall, sexy shopkeeper like me possibly be a danger to you kids? I just run this not-shady-at-all candy shop in an area devoid of people. Besides, it's not my fault you were so entranced by my collection of candy. Blaming little old me for your inattentiveness, are you?"

Gokudera barked, "What was that?!" He lit his ready dynamite and prepared to throw.

Tsuna's alarms were ringing of impending danger. He reached over and put out the wicks with his fingers. "We're sorry for intruding. We'll be going now." And with that, Tsuna pushed his Guardian out the door before he could start another argument.

The shop was silent once more like it had been for years. The man covered his mouth with his white folding fan and tipped his head forward so that his hat would shadow his eyes. "I have a feeling we'll be meeting again soon, little prince."

* * *

><p>Outside, the prince was struggling to hold back his Guardian from reentering the shop. "Please let me go, Tsuna-sama. I need to teach him a lesson!"<p>

Tsuna refused to let him go. "That's not a good idea, Gokudera-kun. He's not as he seems. He's much stronger than what he looks, more than what either of us can handle. Please, let's go home. Okay?"

Gokudera stopped trying to pull forward and calmed. "If that's what you want, my prince."

Relieved that his Guardian had given up the fight, Tsuna let go of his shirt. As he straightened out his clothes, he sighed, "Ah, I told you that you can't call me that. Not outside."

"I'm so sorry, my pri—Tsuna-sama," Gokudera hastily corrected.

Tsuna stretched and picked up his bag that he had laid down on the floor. "Well, come on. I need to start lunch soon." He spun to face the street again and started the trek back. Gokudera grabbed his three bags and followed, but not before glaring at the suspicious shop.

* * *

><p>"We're back," Tsuna called into the house.<p>

Reborn leapt down from… somewhere and landed on Tsuna's shoulder. He smacked the fluffy brown hair with an ornamental fan. "You're late. Hurry up and make lunch."

"You could've made something yourself if you were really that hungry," Tsuna replied, but he put down the bag and fished out the new recipe books to prepare lunch while Reborn jumped onto Gokudera's shoulder. Tsuna then disappeared into the kitchen a moment later. "I'll be done in maybe half an hour, okay? Gokudera-kun, please unpack the items."

"Yes, my prince!" the silver-haired boy replied promptly. He took all four bags in his arms and shot upstairs to prepare their schoolbags and put away the surplus.

"Report," Reborn demanded when Gokudera reached his room.

Gokudera paused in taking out the bags' contents to address Reborn. "Yes, Reborn-san. Nothing went wrong when we were in the shopping district, but as we left and headed home, Tsuna-sama got a little weird and went into a suspicious shop. Inside was a sketchy shopkeeper."

"Oh? How so?"

"He wore mostly Japanese traditional clothes with a striped bucket hat. He insisted he was not dangerous, but I didn't hear him walk and didn't even know he was there until he talked." Gokudera scoffed and resumed preparation for school. "Tsuna-sama said he was dangerous, too, and he wouldn't let me fight him."

"It's good that you didn't."

Gokudera stiffened from the serious tone easily discernible in Reborn's voice. "Reborn-san?" The stony expression on the baby hitman's face froze any other utterances.

"If he is who I think he is, it's better if you never met him at all."

* * *

><p>Tsuna, Gokudera, and Bianchi went to Nami Chuu to finalize the registration process (for Tsuna), complete the forms and submit them (for Gokudera), and start school. The school year had already begun in April; it was mid-May now.<p>

Bianchi led the way to the office, Tsuna and Gokudera trailing behind her with a small bit of distance between. The office assistant raised her head at the sound of the door opening. With a false smile, she greeted, "Hello, welcome to Nami Chuu."

"Hey." Bianchi approached the desk and slapped down two thick packets of paper. "I'm here to register these two kids for the first year."

The lady maintained her plastic smile. "Okay, then. The principal's office is right over there. These are the rules of conduct. Please follow them." She heaved up two heavy, unwieldy books and let them slam onto the counter. The covers of the books were black and plain, with the words "Nami Chuu Rules", and under that was "Follow them or I'll bite you to death". Two tonfas, one crossed over the other, were the only other things that adorned the covers.

Tsuna looked dubiously at the book that was pushed toward him. _Who is "I"? Is that even legal?_

Gokudera, the ever-helpful Guardian that he was, picked up Tsuna's copy of the book, which Tsuna really did not want to lug around all day. He doubted Bianchi would take it home for him; the only requests she was bound to follow were from Reborn, and Tsuna only recently met her, not enough time to form a close bond. "Let's go, Tsuna-sama."

"Right."

* * *

><p>The rest of the registration process went simply and smoothly. The principal made introductions, entered their information into the database, and gave them their schedules (his secretary was sick that day). He flagged down a student with a pompadour to lead them to their class. Bianchi left as soon as that was done.<p>

Tsuna and Gokudera had mostly the same schedule. The only difference was that Tsuna was taking a culinary class and Gokudera was taking music. Gokudera had wanted to take the culinary class with Tsuna, but Tsuna strongly recommended against it.

* * *

><p>The school day had already started. The oddly-dressed student silently led the two to their shared class, science. He knocked on the doorframe and slid the door open. It caught the attention of the room's occupants.<p>

The teacher at the chalkboard started yelling, "Who is interrupting my teachi—?!" One look at the people at the door stopped him. His tone immediately became more respectful. "Disciplinary-san, is there anything wrong?"

"New students," he succinctly replied. He handed the teacher two sheets of paper with basic information about them.

The teacher quickly scanned through the words. "Alright. Thank you, Disciplinary-san."

The black-clad student nodded and left the room, leaving Tsuna and Gokudera standing at the front.

"Welcome to Nami Chuu. I am the greatly esteemed Nezu Dohachiro. You shall address me as Nezu-sensei. You may introduce yourselves to the class."

Tsuna and Gokudera wrote their names on the board with the pieces of chalk they were handed. Tsuna bowed politely to the class. "Hello. My name is Sawada Tsunayoshi. Please take care of me."

Gokudera was not as pleasant in his introductions. "Tch. Don't bother me."

Unsurprisingly, their new classmates talked about Gokudera more. Tsuna faded into the background when next to the silver-haired Italian. Tsuna was not fully Japanese either, but his foreign blood was much less obvious.

"It's a hot foreigner." Definitely a girl.

"A total bad-boy type." And another.

"Heh. He's not so cool." Obviously a guy.

"They look interesting." Oh? A guy actually took notice of Tsuna's existence. The person in question had a cheery atmosphere, but under that Tsuna could perceive a deep sadness and loneliness. The smile was fake, a mask.

"Sawada-kun, you sit over there. Gokudera-kun, over there." Tsuna snapped out of his contemplations and the duo took their seats. Class resumed, excitement about transfer students dying down eventually.

* * *

><p>After science was lunch. Tsuna had made them both bentos, not fancy but decent. Before any girls could approach them, Gokudera led Tsuna out of the class to eat elsewhere. They ended up in the courtyard under a still-blooming sakura tree off to the side. Lunch passed peacefully and undisturbed.<p>

* * *

><p>The next class was practical arts. Tsuna went to the culinary room and Gokudera went to the music room, albeit reluctant to be separated from his boss. Tsuna was introduced again and partnered with a girl he remembered was in his science class, although he didn't get her name then. That was quickly remedied.<p>

"Hi, Tsunayoshi-kun. I am Sasagawa Kyoko. Nice to meet you and welcome to Nami Chuu," she politely said.

Tsuna smiled back at her. "Nice to meet you too, Kyoko-chan."

The pair worked quickly and efficiently, finishing their project before any others. Tsuna gained more confidence with the utensils and his actions. They got full marks and bonus points for completing the assignment so swiftly and perfectly.

The partnership proved to be very beneficial. Kyoko was a master in cooking, so Tsuna learned new kitchen skills from Kyoko and she gave him some easy recipes to try.

They enjoyed their macaroons while exchanging light conversation and watching the other students struggle with the cream.

* * *

><p>Nana took a stroll through the countryside followed by her guards. She had taken care of all the work that needed to be done, and no one had attempted an attack on Merith, which was no surprise. Now she was spending her time relaxing and thinking about her son.<p>

Tsu-kun was growing up into an admirable man. He was a bit small for his age but was very capable, unwilling to let obstacles stop him. She could depend on him if there ever was a need to. He would come to her aid if she asked.

Nana had run all of the diversions that were asked for. The records were altered to hide Tsu-kun's early history, but not enough to evoke suspicion from most people. It was not commonly known that she and her son originally lived in another country. The people thought they had been well-hidden within the castle and only recently made an appearance because of the death of the previous heir.

Nana's existence was known; Tsuna's had been unexpected. They hadn't been aware of a seven-year old prince living within the castle; his birth was never announced. Regardless, they accepted him, although they still didn't know who his father was.

The district she was traversing was more rural than the others. Only a few houses dotted the land here and there. A clear, wide river wound across the fertile ground, licking at the roots of huge apple trees. The apples themselves were large, much larger than normal Merith apples, which dwarfed apples of other origins. One of these apples had to be carried in two hands because of their inordinately hefty size. The only reason they didn't smash open when they fell from the trees was the springy soft grass carpeting the entire glade. It was dangerous for people to walk under the trees during the ripening season, though, so they were advised to stay away. Death by falling apples was an odd way to die.

It was just past ripening season now. All the apples were plucked from the trees or retrieved from the grass, so the broad branches of the trees were bare, and the grass was not dotted with shiny red. Wait… that point right there. A patch of red stood out among the green grass. The harvesters must have missed one. Smiling, she made her way toward it.

The closer she got to the fallen apple, the more she felt it was not. When she finally reached it, she found a young boy, maybe the age of her Tsu-kun, dozing under the apple tree. The red blotch was an apple, but not a real one. It appeared to be a hat.

A young voice shook her out of her thoughts. "Has the fairy queen come to visit me? Oh, and with her legion of sprites, too." She looked down at the boy's face. His green eyes marked underneath with triangles (tattoos?) were now open and looking at her.

"Oh, hello there. I was wondering what you were doing out here," she responded. She completely ignored the way he referred to her.

The green-haired boy sprawled all over the grass and cushioned his head with his arms. "Mm, something told me that something interesting was going to happen today and to come here. My life is usually very boring, so I thought, 'Why not?' Everything is always so quiet and carefree here. No one even noticed when I drifted down the river into the ocean once. That was fun."

Nana was a little concerned about the boy's situation. "Who do you live with, child? Don't they take care of you?"

"My granny's the only one left, I think. She just stays inside the house all the time, though. She doesn't do anything. It's boring there, so I come out to play. Much more interesting."

Nana hummed in thought. So his grandmother was either too ill or uncaring to mind over this child. She couldn't have that. "Do you think it would be more fun to move away from here? I'll send someone to take care of your granny for you so you don't have to worry about her," Nana proposed.

The boy blinked bland eyes at her. "Really? And go where?"

"My son's having his own adventure right now. Would you like to go play with him?" Nana knew she could trust her son to do this, to care for this emotionally-dead child who she felt had an odd power unfamiliar to her. She didn't think it was a spirit's inheritance; it was something new. In that case, Tsuna and his new tutor could probably find out what it is and help him learn to control it. Uncontrolled power was dangerous for everyone.

The boy rolled to his feet, unencumbered by the bulky hat. "Sure. I'd like to go to the fairy prince."

She knelt and patted his head. "That's good to hear." Then she remembered she never introduced herself. She laughed lightly. "This is a bit late, but I am Nana la Alsveith."

The boy gave a tiny bow and replied, "My name is Fran."

* * *

><p>Ciel was understandably frustrated. How many short, fluffy-haired teens with a baby could there have been in the area? For some reason, there were plenty reportedly matching the description. From Australia, they found thirteen different trails, each ending in a far-off country, each as plausible as the next, not including the possibility that the prince simply got back onto the same ship he arrived in. The first two trails met dead ends. Each took several weeks to reach and investigate, and there was not a single sign that indicated the prince's presence.<p>

Ciel looked over the list of possibilities again. Eleven countries left before they would have to start over with the log from _8059_. This _Reborn_ was very skilled with deviating attention from the target.

The Underworld Prince anticipated their meeting. He always did appreciate a devious mind.

"Hey, Ciel, did you find him yet?" a brash voice rang out.

"No," Ciel hissed to the orange-haired guard. He was really getting on his nerves. Ichigo was loud and quick to enter a fight when he felt someone close to him was getting insulted, which wore away Ciel's patience with the frequent conflicts breaking out whenever they went into a city to ask around. Ichigo didn't even speak Spanish. How would he know if his family or friends were being insulted?

Maybe Ciel could just _accidentally_ leave him here in Chile?

* * *

><p>I didn't want to do the typical "You saved me from my own bombs" scene. I guess I'll be keeping the name Merith. Dynamite cooking came from a demotivational poster. I don't know how many free rooms are in the house. I'm making it up. Wow. These sentences are very disconnected. Whatever. I changed Fran's age. Yay.<p>

Can anyone explain to me what happened to Rasiel? Did Byakuran save him or raise him from the dead? What did he do for the ten years he pretended to be dead? Was it ever explained? I might be planning to use him later.

If it ended in a slash pairing, they could just have a surrogate, couldn't they? (I still won't write a child in at the end, no matter the answer.)

Posted: 1/18/15


	6. Chapter 6 (and Extra)

Chapter 6

School went thankfully normally for Tsuna. No one seemed to remember him from their early childhood. He figured that as long as he didn't stand out, he wouldn't have to worry about being targeted. That was easily done. He had an appearance that was cursorily overlooked, and being with Gokudera kept away the others. The Storm Guardian was startlingly protective of him, going so far as growling at anyone who appeared threatening—which was pretty much anyone that came within five feet. As Tsuna was constantly ignored and let alone, he let go of his previous apprehension regarding school.

A week passed by without any notable incidents.

* * *

><p>At home, Reborn and Gokudera taught Tsuna about the history of the Vongola, its leaders, and his standing in it. As Tsuna already knew the school material, not much time was spent on homework, just a couple of minutes to do the unnecessary work. A day into the Vongola lessons, Reborn tried to shoot Tsuna with a Dying Will bullet to demonstrate the power of Flames (as if the streams of fire that were shot at him were not enough), but Tsuna evaded them with quick reflexes as soon as he saw Leon transform into a gun. He dodged even more fervently after learning the effects of the bullets.<p>

He was a prince. Princes should not streak naked.

"Stand still so I can shoot you." Reborn shot two more bullets, both of which swerved away because of Tsuna's wind manipulation.

Tsuna ran behind the couch, which caught another bullet in place of Tsuna. It would need to be replaced; there were multiple holes and burn marks littered across its surface. "No way! I am _not_ going streaking, no matter what," Tsuna growled.

Reborn ran behind the couch and aimed. "You'd still have your boxers on." Another shot was fired. It missed like the previous twenty-four.

Tsuna skittered away and took refuge behind the kitchen door. "It's still public indecency!"

Several bullets more, and Reborn gave up his attempts in forcing Tsuna into the Dying Will Mode. It was the easiest way in learning how to control flames, but not the only way. Vongola Primo learned without any artificial aids. Besides, Tsuna already had experience in drawing out supernatural powers, like his spirit inheritance. Flames followed a similar process, using strong will and intent.

"Fine then. Be aware that the alternative method is much more difficult. It hasn't been used in centuries, so details about this path are a little hazy."

"It's better than running around naked and without full conscious thought."

And so started Tsuna's more difficult Flame training.

* * *

><p>Reborn and Tsuna sat across from each other at the dining table while Reborn explained the process of natural Flame training and access. "Accessing Flames can be achieved by resonating with an item of strong attachment. Vongola Primo was a fist-fighter, and he bonded with his gloves, which were later upgraded to withstand his altered fighting style when he added Flames. What you're going to try to do is replicate that. Find an item you have a strong attachment to and push Flames into it."<p>

Tsuna hummed in thought, considering which of his possessions that could be. "And how do I do that?"

"Since you won't be using the full capability of the Flames, it should be easier to generate even without a medium. The item should help unlock your Flames and call them when you need them, but eventually you should be able to use your Flames without its help. The Flame won't be able to do any damage, so even if the item you test is not what you're looking for, it won't be burned. I would imagine it is like summoning your wind. Will it to appear and direct it to the item you're testing."

"How long will this take? You make it sound like it will be a while before I will be able to use my Flames without help."

"That depends on your capabilities, and you should know that gaining control of powers takes a lot of practice. Didn't you go through this with your spirit inheritances? And even after you gain unguided access of your Flames, it would be a good idea to keep your item on you. It'll give you a boost in power and control."

Tsuna stood up. "Well, if that's all, I'll go look now." He pushed the chair in and left the table.

Reborn smirked. "He's still a child, so eager to play with fire. But fire is dangerous, and he needs to be careful, or else he'll burn."

* * *

><p>Tsuna headed to his room immediately since that was where he kept all of his personal belongings. He sat on the bed and tried to summon the fire that Reborn told him about. Will a Flame to appear…<p>

A tiny flickering orange Flame lit on the tip of his index finger. It quivered in the nonexistent breeze and gave off no heat. Tsuna broke his concentration from surprise, and the flickering Flame disappeared. Well, that was quite simple. Tsuna repeated the process, and the Flame sprang back to life. He smiled at the merrily dancing Flame for a few minutes before his objective came back into his mind, and he allowed the Flame to disperse again.

Tsuna scanned his room. It was barren of what most teens would have in their room. A simple bed, desk, and his bag were all that populated his room. Shrugging, Tsuna picked up the bag from the wall it was leaning against and walked back to his previous position on his bed.

Tsuna scattered the sparse contents of his bag across his bed. He hadn't brought many things from Merith in order to keep the load light, and he hadn't bought many items since arriving in Namimori either. Mechanically, he tested each of the items that came out of his bag—a few trinkets he picked up while he went shopping with Reborn, then from the trip with Gokudera… The gun that Reborn told him to keep close _just in case_ had no reaction. The iron claw gauntlet he bought on a whim (just because it looked cool) was also unaffected. The pocketknife's tip sparked a little, but the flash of fire flittered out of existence just as soon as it caught.

Then a thought struck him.

Tsuna dubiously looked at his phone lying innocently on the floor next to his bed. "Wait… it couldn't be…" He slid off the bed, crawled over, and plucked the phone from the floor. The keychain dangled from where it hung. The keychain was a reminder of optimism for him. It was a naive belief and goal, but he left Merith to change Vongola. It was a resolution he wanted to accomplish. In addition to that, it symbolized his relationship with Reborn, who promised to stay by his side and help him erase the bloody history of Vongola…

_It can't hurt to try, I guess._ He pushed a tiny bit of Flames out and observed the reaction of the keychain.

Nothing.

Tsuna was half-disappointed and half-relieved—disappointed because he still hadn't found his closest bonded item and relieved because then that meant he wouldn't be fighting with a keychain. He didn't know if a weapon choice could get any weirder than that.

The soul of Vongola Quarto shook irritably, feeling that his weapon was insulted.

He sighed and collapsed on his bed, then shot back up as something pointy jabbed his lower back. Ah, it was the crown.

He gave a considering look toward it. _Maybe…?_ He picked up the crown and let the spark of Flame touch the metal, and to his surprise its entire brim caught fire for half a second and shone enchantingly at him before the Flame flashed and died. Just to be sure, he sparked the Flame again. Same result.

Tsuna smiled happily. He finally found a suitable conductor for his Flames. He wouldn't have to burst naked in order to use them! Then a question shot through him.

How is a crown a weapon?

* * *

><p>"Detached control over the battlefield," Reborn proposed.<p>

"Huh?" Tsuna was confused. What did that have to do with their current conversation?

"That's how a king handles a war, isn't it?" the tiny tutor clarified. "Indirect fighting. A king tells the soldiers what to do."

Tsuna leaned back against his pillow propped up against the headboard. "Don't they have commanders?"

"The king employs those commanders."

"Huh… so how do I do this?"

"Figure the rest out yourself." And Reborn jumped out the window, leaving Tsuna to figure out the difficult parts on his own. Again.

"Of course…" Resigned, Tsuna also left his room, heading to the backyard to attempt to utilize the crown as a weapon. No way was he going to risk burning anything inside.

* * *

><p>He had no idea what to do. Reborn only told him the bare basics and left him to struggle. "Find a solution for an impossible situation, right? Well then…"<p>

For starters, he put the crown in place as normal. It's a crown, so he should wear it as a crown… but then what? Flames?

And just like that, the crown's brim flashed the brightly burning Flames. Again he was startled by the sudden fire, but this time the Flames did not waver and die. Huh. So he activated the Flames. Now control…?

Hesitantly, he raised his right arm and pointed his hand at a small rock several meters away. How was he supposed to direct Flames at it?

Again, the Flames bowed to his thoughts. A ball of energy coalesced in his palm and materialized in the form of an orange fire cat. The flickering feline yowled before lunging at the rock as if it were a formidable enemy. As soon as the cat touched the rock, it lost its form and burst in a spectacular display of flashes, sparks, and fire. When the smoke cleared, there was a small pit where the rock used to be.

Tsuna stood in silence for several minutes before he got over his surprise. "…Huh. That was surprisingly easy."

Tsuna continued to play with his newly discovered Flame animals for several hours, learning how to control them better and add more features.

* * *

><p>When Tsuna retired back to his room for a short rest before making dinner, Reborn was waiting for him. Apparently, he had been watching part of his training from the window. Reborn stared into Tsuna's eyes with his own black, soul-piercing eyes. "Not bad. You made Flame soldiers."<p>

"Flame animals," Tsuna corrected.

Reborn frowned at being interrupted. "You're using them as soldiers."

Here Tsuna became nervous. "Well…"

The hitman could guess what he had done. Tsuna's skittishness said it all. "You better not have materialized one as a pet."

Tsuna was suspiciously silent for too long. "...I didn't," he finally muttered, not looking into Reborn's eyes as he said so.

Reborn snorted. "You're a horrible liar."

Tsuna's new Flame lion purred as it walked out of Tsuna's closet—where he had hidden him—and jumped onto Tsuna's lap, nuzzling into a hand to be petted.

Reborn looked pointedly at the evidence.

"Uh…" Tsuna fumbled for an explanation, but found that there was no reasonable excuse. He sighed and decided not to hide. "His name is Natsu…"

* * *

><p>The lion was really just a small cub, not even at the height of Reborn. Tsuna had accumulated enough experience in Flame animal creation that he was able to make him look more realistic, so most of the Flames that made up the lion's body were altered to make the tiny lion appear to be a very realistic cub, although Tsuna couldn't do anything about the fiery mane and the tuft of the tail.<p>

Out of all of the animals that Tsuna created, he liked the lion the most. He didn't know why; he never gave much thought on lions before. Regardless, Tsuna decided he would keep the lion cub materialized as company, completely disregarding the possible damages that could abound. Tsuna figured that anything that was damaged could just be replaced; it wasn't as if Tsuna was tight on money.

After Tsuna solidified the lion's body to have fur and claws, he gave him a name—Natsu because the flames he radiated reminded him of soft summer warmth and as a reversal of his own name.

* * *

><p>"Right. And how are you going to keep him alive? It's not a normal animal."<p>

"Oh! Already figured that out—watch." Tsuna cupped his hands and brought forth a harmless Flame. He lowered the Flame to the tiny lion's level, and Natsu eagerly jumped up, landing his front paws on Tsuna's hands to steady himself. Natsu leaned forward and bit at the Flame, which oddly seemed to disappear with each bite. Soon enough, all of the Flame was gone, and the lion appeared sated and content. "When the easily-summoned Flames are fed to him, he is calm and playful. When I feed him the damaging Flames, he loses his docility and gets more aggressive."

Reborn thought over the new information for a minute and came to a decision. "If you can keep him under control, then he can stay in the house. If not, dispel him."

Tsuna's eyes shone brightly. "Okay!" He looked like a kid who got a new puppy.

How cute.

Not that Reborn said that out loud. Or in his mind. Actually, that sentiment never existed. Reborn does not think cute. Or so he says…

* * *

><p>Tsuna happily made dinner, his increased skill in the kitchen shining through with more intricate dishes and complex tastes. He had already fed Natsu with harmless Flames, and the lion was currently asleep on Tsuna's bed.<p>

Tsuna relayed his new findings about his Flames during dinner that day. Gokudera was expectedly impressed, and Bianchi seemed interested in seeing the Flame animals.

"There is a problem with your fighting mode, though," Reborn said.

Tsuna looked up from his bowl of rice. "How? I thought it worked fine. If I send Flame animals to fight, then I won't get hurt since I'll be afar."

"Wrong. Right now you have only long-range attacks, which is troubling if you ever meet an opponent with higher speed. The enemy will be able to dodge all of your soldiers and attack you. And since you don't have any close-range attacks or defense, you would be dead."

"I can be your defense, my prince!" Gokudera offered.

"No. Your attacks are too volatile to be a defense, and would likely not mix well with the flame animals. The dynamite could explode prematurely if Tsuna's flames hastened the wick," the hitman rejected.

Gokudera sulked. Bianchi patted his shoulder comfortingly and offered poison-flavored ice cream (though it was really poisoned, too) to Gokudera. He refused immediately.

Tsuna asked, "Then what do I do? I could post some animals for defense, but I haven't had any training in close-range combat. Grandfather never set up lessons for me and you haven't either."

Reborn smirked. "We'll just have to fix that, won't we?"

Tsuna started martial arts training the next day, and Reborn called in a friend to help, although he would take a short while to get there. Since Tsuna's body was still soft from castle life, he needed an extensive amount of conditioning, which included runs around the city and weight-training using Leon.

* * *

><p>"Here." After dinner and going back to the bedroom, Reborn threw a thick folded piece of cloth at Tsuna, who caught it deftly with one hand.<p>

"What is this for?" he asked. It didn't seem to be anything special, just a large square of cloth. He placed it on the bed and finished pulling on his pajamas.

"It's Flame-resistant cloth."

"Why do I need it?"

"If you ran around the battlefield wearing a real crown, don't you think someone would link you to Merith? Not many countries still have a reigning monarch now. You'll have to cover it up. Your other hoods would disintegrate if you tried to wear it over the burning crown, so you need to make one out of that."

"Right…" Tsuna looked at the cloth dubiously. "So you want me to make a hood out of this… and I don't know how to sew."

"Go learn how or find someone else to do it," Reborn replied, blasé.

Tsuna picked up the cloth and ran his fingers over it. It was thick and heavy, but surprisingly soft. "Can't you do it?" he asked.

"Do I look like a tailor to you?" the hitman retorted.

"Well you could dress like one—" Reborn shot his gun. Tsuna stopped that line of thought and picked up another. "Why couldn't Leon just make one?"

Leon shifted back to his chameleon form and nestled on Reborn's arm. The tutor-hitman stroked the little green reptile appreciatively. "Idiot. It's already difficult and taxing to make Flame-resistant cloth. Refining it would take more energy and extenuating circumstances, and from what I see, your life is not going to be in danger anytime soon."

Tsuna flumped onto the bed with the cloth in hand. "Okay… Then I need to go into the shopping district again and find a tailor."

* * *

><p>The next morning, Gokudera escorted Tsuna into the shopping district, making sure to avoid the area with the suspicious candy shopkeeper. They scoured the district for a custom clothes maker, but all they could find were shops with premade clothes. Not a single tailoring service existed.<p>

The duo went into a cake shop to take a break before they planned to take the rail to the next town over and restart their search. The displays were stocked neatly with finely decorated cakes, each as appealing as the next. Tsuna selected a slice of chocolate rose cake and Gokudera a slice of raspberry cake. They settled into a booth with the delicate desserts and began to eat, though Tsuna took a picture of them first.

A few minutes into eating them, a girl approached their table. "Wow! That cake looks delicious. Which one is it?" she asked as she pointed to Gokudera's cake.

"Don't bother me, woman. Go away," the bomber hissed. Gokudera was not so happy that someone interrupted his time with the prince.

"Gokudera-kun, please be courteous," Tsuna gently reprimanded. "It's a raspberry cake. We're sorry. I think he's a little irritated because we couldn't find what we were looking for."

All thoughts about the cake and the rude boy were quelled by the kind apology and banished from her head as curiosity took their place. "Oh? And what's that?"

"Well, I need a tailor to make something for me, but there's none here. We're going to look in the next town, but that's going to make us take more time than I thought we would need." Tsuna rummaged in his bag and pulled out the Flame-resistant cloth. "See this? I need it to be made into a hood."

The girl's eyes got bright as she caught sight of the odd cloth. "What material is that? I don't think I've ever seen it before."

Tsuna flailed for an answer. He couldn't just say it was a special cloth that came from a shape-shifting chameleon, could he? He settled for a vague reply. "It's a rare material that is hard to produce."

"Huh… Would you mind if I made the hood for you? I'd like to try handling that cloth. I know how to sew because I'm a costumer for plays."

"Really? At such a young age?"

"I host kids' plays when I'm able to. I make all of the costumes on my own, so I have a lot of experience with sewing."

"Well, if you think you can do it, why not?"

* * *

><p>The girl's name was Miura Haru. She lived outside of Namimori, but close enough to attend the prestigious all-girls school called Midori Middle. She was quite friendly with Tsuna, animatedly relaying her plays to him which completely ignoring the grouchy silver-haired teen that followed behind them. She still didn't like him for his initial words. First impressions leave a mark, after all.<p>

She followed them home, and since it was a weekend, there was no schoolwork to deal with first. She excitedly prepared the sewing kit that Tsuna bought on her recommendation and got to work with designing. She looked at the hoods that Tsuna showed her to base the design on. They were wide-brimmed and simple, although that one had soft feathers lining the edge.

Just a hood is too plain, right? Maybe a full body cloak. That would be more dramatic…

* * *

><p>Several hours later, Haru presented her work to Tsuna. The end result was a hooded cloak that reached his ankles with gold embroidery threading a curling design along the hems. The intricate add-on gave Reborn an idea. The tiny tutor approached the girl smiling proudly. "Hey. Can you add this onto the back?"<p>

"Huh?" She snapped out of her self-praise and looked at the piece of paper being held out by what seemed to be a short businessman. A _very_ short businessman. The paper had what seemed to be a family crest drawn onto it. No one really had those anymore. Maybe Tsuna was of old blood?

Haru took the paper and nodded. "I can do that. It'll take me longer since it's so detailed, though."

"That's fine."

Tsuna protested. "Reborn, she just worked for a long time. Don't make her feel obligated to do more. I think she needs a break at least."

Haru shook her head. "Oh, that's fine, Tsuna-san. I can do this. It's actually quite fun. But I would appreciate a snack." She never got to buy a cake at the shop because they wanted to start on the hood and went straight to Tsuna's house after buying the supplies.

Tsuna smiled. "In that case, leave those there and we can go fix something up." He motioned for her to follow him.

* * *

><p>In the kitchen, Tsuna and Haru prepared light snacks and swapped recipes and techniques. Apparently, Haru was good at cooking as well. She promised to come over and teach Tsuna more when she could.<p>

* * *

><p>"…And finished… again!" The cloak now had the Vongola crest stitched onto the back in shimmering gold thread.<p>

"Wow, Haru, it looks amazing. Thanks again," Tsuna said while marveling over the ornate black cloak. It reminded him of the formal white garments he wore as a prince, though the color ranges were completely different.

"You're welcome, Tsuna-san. It was my pleasure," Haru replied. Then she caught sight of the clock and realized the time. "I should probably leave now; it's going to get late. I'll see you sometime soon!" With a wave of farewell, Haru left the house.

"She could be useful later. You should hire her as a personal seamstress," Reborn suggested.

"Reborn, she's a civilian. I don't want to taint her with the dangers of the mafia when I still haven't changed the Vongola. Besides, I don't know if that'll even be her occupation."

"It's still an idea you should keep in your mind. She's skilled with a needle."

"She is," Tsuna admitted.

* * *

><p>Disproportionate statistics! How fun.<p>

No one has a problem with my story's direction? I have been given no suggestions, so my plot sketch has gotten a bit… questionable. I feel like I'm cramming a lot of plots together.

Thanks to Jucca for pointing out the episode of the twins' history and Natsu Yuuki for answering.

It takes me hours to write one chapter. I prefer reading.

* * *

><p>This <strong>extra piece<strong> is dedicated to Heart of Fire and Ice.

**Extra chapter: History between Ichigo and Tsuna**

It was supposed to be a normal grocery run. Ichigo and his mother went out to buy food for their growing family, but on the trip back they met trouble. They were taking their regular path home when a couple of drunken men neared them. The street was oddly empty, although that might have been because night was approaching.

One of the men stumbled as he came closer. "Ho? What do we have here? Hey lady, would you be willing to donate a little bit of money for a poor old man?" He waved a switchblade in his hand and leered at Masaki, who gathered her son into her trembling arms.

"No. I think we'll be going home now. You can have some food if you'd like." She proffered one of the grocery bags to him.

The man snarled and roughly snatched Ichigo out of her loosened grasp. She screamed in fright for her son. "Listen. If you don't give us money, we're taking it out on your son."

"Hey, aren't you taking this a bit far?" one of the other drunks slurred.

"Shut up. You need money too, don't you?"

"Please, I only brought enough money for the groceries. Give my son back!"

"Is that a no? Well…" The blade swung down, aimed at Ichigo's arm.

"Ichigo!"

There was a flash of silver, a pained gasp, and a splash of red on his cheek. He swept a hand over the wet spot and looked at the smudge of blood that was transferred onto his palm. Blood. Blood. Blood. Mother? "Kaa-san?" His mother had run forward and covered her son with her body. The blade was embedded in her back. A river of red flooded down from the open wound. "Kaa-san!"

Ichigo's shout shocked the drunken man out of his daze. "T-that—you shouldn't have done that!" the man shrieked. He was only going to cut the boy's arm a little to show blood. No one was supposed to be grievously wounded.

"H-hey!" The intoxicated man fled stumblingly, and his friends followed as fast as they could.

Masaki collapsed to the concrete, blood pouring out at an alarming rate. "Ichigo…" She raised a pale hand to her son's cheek, a final gesture of love before her body gave out.

He was just eight years old when he watched his mother die from blood loss.

* * *

><p>After the funeral for Masaki was over, Isshin took his three children to his original country. It was much safer there. Merith had low crime rates from the beginning because the spirits were strict in admittance of people. Anyone they disapproved of was deported by the orders of the king, who heeded their words.<p>

Isshin reclaimed his former post as head of security, and no one argued against it. They all knew of his loyalty and strength. Isshin was not weakened at all by his civilian life; he kept his strength up even then.

In addition to his natural power, he had a spirit partner. Engetsu was a Dark Lunar Wolf that bonded to him during his youth, and he was quite happy to reestablish their spiritual link. Engetsu enabled Isshin to use a degree of his own power, which was a destructive wave of pure energy. When linked, his speed was given a large boost and his physical strength multiplied.

A few years passed by peacefully, with Ichigo and his sisters integrating into Merithian life easily. They were given quarters in the castle because of their father's station and were provided with tutors of their own.

In that time, he made a strong resolve to protect. He grew bigger and stronger. From the time he was traumatized, he trained on his own with what he could. He wanted to get stronger to protect his family from any harm that may come their way.

His father watched him with a sad and resigned expression. It seemed his son wouldn't be entering an occupation like doctor as he originally thought. Ichigo's mother's death was a large turning point in his life.

* * *

><p>When Ichigo was ten, Isshin took his children on a picnic in a forest far from human inhabitation.<p>

While the twins chased butterflies and played ball in the flower field within the forest, Isshin watched his son a little ways away. Ichigo sat within the woods on his own, but not for long. The young boy was approached by a Dark Lunar Wolf with a shoulder height higher than he was tall.

Isshin deliberately chose this forest to picnic in. It was where he found his own spirit partner.

The wolf, Zangetsu, coincidentally Engetsu's son, spent the next several hours lazing with Ichigo, curled together in gentle spring light. Unsurprisingly, they made a bond by the end of the day.

Isshin started training his son for combat soon after that.

* * *

><p>A year after linking with Zangetsu, he was introduced to the little prince, who had just come from a different country. He was betting on Japan since that was the only language he seemed to know. The small boy was shy, peeking at him from behind the regent queen.<p>

Boldly, he walked from his father's side to him. "My name is Ichigo. Nice to meet you." He gave the timid boy a smile, which seemed to melt the prince's hesitance away.

"M-my name is Tsuna," the prince replied. The adults watched the children interact, relieved that Tsuna was letting down his barriers and talking with another child. Nana was initially apprehensive because in Japan, he was often ignored or even abused by the other kids. It seemed she would not have to worry about that here, at least not with Ichigo.

Over the next few weeks, Tsuna completely let go of his barriers and joyfully played with Ichigo outside of his lesson times. Ichigo regarded him as a younger brother, fondly praising him when he did well on his lessons and indulging him with piggy-back rides.

* * *

><p>Ichigo was fifteen when he was appointed to be his guard by his father. He did not protest. It allowed him to keep a closer eye on Tsuna.<p>

Tsuna started to skive off some of his lessons around then. The districts were much more interesting, and the people were friendly enough to talk to. They were aware that Tsuna was escaping for a short amount of time and indulged his play. The stall keepers liked when the prince came to talk to them and asked about their problems. Usually, any complaints given were fixed within a week. They thanked him by giving him the best fruits they had on stock when he came by. During one of the trips, Tsuna found a family that was struggling to pull in enough income. Every time after that, Tsuna pulled out some of his allowance and gave it to the family when he could. He also passed the fruits he was given to them.

Ichigo was aware of all this. He allowed Tsuna to make his runs and apprehended him when he finished, when he felt there was danger, or when there was something to be done at the castle. Of course, when Tsuna snuck out too much, he curbed the trips then too. The escapades became something of a game then. Tsuna improved his hiding skills and Ichigo worked on detection.

That Vongola delegate broke that cycle. He lured Tsuna from a safe home and was trying to get him involved in organized crime. The mafia? No. Tsuna was too soft for that kind of life. Ichigo would bring his little brother back safely.

Posted: 1/25/15


	7. Chapter 7

Tsuna continued to hone his Flames, although it was difficult with the limited space of his yard, and he had to make sure no one saw them—quite difficult considering the flashes of light and loud booms of explosions.

Reborn watched his progress carefully. The little prince was doing quite well, all things considered.

Natsu was also training, coordinating his attacks with Tsuna's. In each training session, Tsuna fed the lion a little of his attack Flames, which made the cub jump into a somewhat larger form, then reaching Tsuna's waist. Natsu's attacks were much more powerful than the incorporeal animals that Tsuna created as base attacks. Reborn wondered what would happen if Tsuna fed Natsu more attack Flames than he currently did. When the damage Flames ran out, Natsu would shrink back into his cub form, tired and spent. Tsuna would then give Natsu some harmless flames, and the lion would jump back to his paws, ready to play.

There were still plenty of holes in his defense, but Tsuna was starting to train his Flames to make sentinel leopards. They were large enough to cover Tsuna when it was needed but lithe enough not to get in the way of launching attacks.

His martial arts tutor should be arriving soon. Speaking of whom, he had his own student already. She'd be coming as well, from what he'd said to Reborn.

* * *

><p>Tsuna and Kyoko paired up during cooking class every day. She continued to teach him new techniques while completing each project, which they were always the first to finish. Tsuna had a very good grade in that class—not that he was bad in any others. He got high test scores since the lessons were just review to him, but Gokudera always placed first. Tsuna missed a couple of questions, and the Storm Guardian never missed any. It may have been review, but Tsuna couldn't remember all of the minute details.<p>

As the two ate their angel cake, they watched one group still preparing the batter, and winced when their blender splashed the mix all over the lagging students. The splattered students were sent to the office for a change of clothes. They'd be getting zeroes for the day. Well, they wouldn't have finished in time anyways.

Tsuna's eyes roamed to another group, this one having the batter in the oven and making the frosting. He could tell that they would have an incomplete or botched product, though—they forgot to sift the flour. He could tell because at the corner of their station, the sifter lay untouched.

"Tsuna-kun," a gentle voice broke through his mind's wandering thoughts.

Tsuna turned his attention back to Kyoko and put down his emptied plate, which had only crumbs remaining. "Yes, Kyoko-chan?"

The girl hesitated for a slight moment before forging on. "I was thinking of making something new at home, but I'm not sure I'll be able to do it. It's a long and complicated recipe. The timing is very specific, so I wanted someone to help me with it. Would you be willing to help?"

"Sure. When did you want to do it?"

Kyoko brightened and said, "I have all of the ingredients ready at home right now. Can you come over tomorrow after school?"

Tsuna nodded. "Yes. I'll need to make some preparations first, though." He'd need to tell Reborn and Gokudera so they wouldn't come looking for him when he failed to arrive home at the normal time.

* * *

><p>"I've made some plans for tomorrow, so I won't be coming home right away after school," he told Reborn later that afternoon.<p>

Reborn looked up from petting Leon. "Don't start slacking off. Remember, school life is just a front. You came here to train to be the heir of a mafia syndicate, not to socialize."

"I know, but it can't hurt to take a break once in a while. Straining myself would set me back."

"Hn."

"Where are you going?" Bianchi asked as she put down tea, which was surprisingly _not_ poisoned.

_Is it just the food that becomes poison or can she control it?_ Tsuna wondered. "I'm helping Kyoko-chan cook at her house. She wants to try a new recipe," he replied.

Bianchi's eyes lit up. "Oh, your girlfriend? The power of love—"

Tsuna waved his hands in a negative motion. "Ah, no. She's not my girlfriend. She's my partner during cooking class and she teaches me more cooking techniques and recipes."

Her eyes dimmed. "So just a close friend?"

He nodded.

"Love between friends is good, but lovers are much better. You won't understand until you have your own." Here she looked at Reborn, which was mildly disturbing considering Reborn's seemingly appearance as a two-year-old. "You should find your soul mate as soon as possible. Then you can spend more time with them."

Tsuna nervously laughed. It was an uncomfortable talk for him, like the birds and the bees discussion his grandfather had given him. His mother had been absent for some reason… "I'm just thirteen years old. Aren't I a bit too young to be thinking of things like this?"

Vivid red fire lit Bianchi's eyes. _A Storm type?_ Tsuna idly considered. _Just like her brother._

She passionately declared. "You are never too young for love!" She looked towards Reborn again, who still disregarded her attempts of persuasion. Tsuna felt a little bad for her. It seemed Reborn had lost all interest in her from the time she had been his lover to now.

* * *

><p>The next day, Tsuna and Kyoko sped around the kitchen, following the recipe to the letter.<p>

"At seven minutes, remove that from the oven and put it immediately into the fridge," Kyoko instructed.

Tsuna picked up the pot and walked to the counter with containers of all types stacked on it. "What should I put it in?"

Kyoko looked over the miscellaneous containers strewn everywhere and pointed at a medium sized bowl with spotted decorations. "That bowl over there should be fine."

As Tsuna reached over to grab the bowl, the kitchen door burst open, nearly startling him into pushing the ceramic piece over the counter. "Are you doing some extreme cooking, Kyoko?" the silver-haired teen shouted out. "Who's that?" He continued yelling in deafening decibels.

"Hello, Onii-san. Tsuna is a classmate. He's helping me make something," the girl sweetly replied. As soon as she started talking, her brother quieted down.

"Is that so? Whatever it is smells extremely good!" he roared somewhat more quietly, though not by much.

"Thank you, Onii-san. It's still going to be a while before we're finished, but it's going well so far."

"EXTREMELY GOOD LUCK TO YOU!" And with that, the hyper boy shot out the door again.

"That was your brother?" Tsuna was surprised. He was nothing like sweet, gentle Kyoko. They were nearly genetic opposites.

"Un. His name is Ryohei. He's very enthusiastic, most especially in boxing."

"Would he by any chance be the captain of the boxing club?" Tsuna remembered Reborn mentioning something about the captain at some point, something about loudness, liveliness, and… the sun?

Kyoko nodded as he turned off one of the stove's fire. "Yes, but he has problems with recruiting. There are so few members compared to the other clubs."

They continued to discuss as they cooked, skillfully completing each step on the recipe. The end result was pleasing; it ended up just as the recipe said it would. Kyoko and Tsuna worked very well together. They finished cleaning up the expended kitchen just after six, and Tsuna was given a sizeable portion to take with him.

* * *

><p>"I'm home," Tsuna called out. He slipped off his shoes and toed them into the corner in a neat pair. He walked through the genkan and padded into the kitchen. It was a bit late to start dinner, but if he used simple recipes, he should finish on time. From one kitchen into another… Tsuna sighed.<p>

_It's not really all that bad. It's actually enjoyable since it's not stressful, and it's not particularly difficult either_, Tsuna considered. As he pulled out some pots to set up water, he heard the sound of thundering footsteps rapidly descending the stairs. Just a second later, the kitchen door was forcefully shoved open, and his Storm Guardian appeared, heaving out of breath in the doorway.

"Welcome back, Tsuna-sama! I'm sorry I wasn't able to greet you at the door. I was preparing more of my bombs," he panted out.

_Why did you come into the kitchen? Wouldn't a person be expected to go to their room after coming home?_ Tsuna wondered. _And why prepare bombs? It's not like we've entered any danger or are likely to. We haven't entered a single conflict yet, other than the close call with the shady shopkeeper._

He pushed the thoughts away, disregarding it as unimportant. "It's alright, Gokudera-kun. I don't expect that kind of behavior from you. Here, I am just a normal teenager, just like you, remember?"

"If that is what you wish," Gokudera acquiesced.

"And you know, it would be nice if you just called me Tsuna…" he suggested.

"No chance," the bomber immediately replied. "I cannot do that. It would be disrespectful."

Knowing that continuing the conversation in that direction would be pointless, Tsuna veered it into another, inquiring about his day. He listened to the silver-haired teen enthusiastically convey the details of his afternoon spent "punishing the offenders that besmirched Tsuna-sama's name" and "dissuading assassins from pursuing their mission of killing Tsuna-sama," although Tsuna didn't see how that was possible considering he had hidden himself in normality and obscurity so people would not know him, and from what Gokudera was saying, there was a lot of people that fit either or both of the categories.

_So this is why he needed to restock his bombs._ Tsuna grimly smiled. _Those poor people._

"You know, Gokudera-kun, it's not like I go out a lot here, and we haven't been here for long, so most people other than from school don't know me. Even the students generally have no clue who I am. People of Namimori are mostly peaceful and oblivious to nearly everything. They don't notice anything until it's shoved into their face. I've hidden myself well from outside eyes, so Merith and enemy countries shouldn't know I am here, at least not so soon," Tsuna said as he stirred the pot.

Gokudera nodded. "Of course, Tsuna-sama. I've heard you are skilled at evasion and Reborn-san is an expert hitman that covers his tracks well. It'll be a long while before anyone tracks you here or finds out who you are."

Tsuna patiently continued. "Now, following that logic, does it make sense to assume that the person who was smoking in an alleyway was an assassin waiting for me to walk by? All the way on the other side of Namimori?"

"He could have had associates spread out all over the city!" Gokudera defended. "And if one person is discovered, the rest leave because their cover is blown. It's better to be safe about it. Your life is very important, Tsuna-sama, not only to Merith, but to Vongola and to me as well."

"Alright," Tsuna conceded, "but could you at least make sure they are dangerous people before you attack them? I highly doubt that the perfume shop worker was trying to lace you with poison to carry back to me."

* * *

><p>A little more cajoling, and Gokudera agreed to be more cautious in throwing around his dynamite. Tsuna was thankful for that. Aside from innocent people getting hurt, there were plentiful amounts of destruction left behind by careless explosions, which did not bode well for the city cleanup crew. Hopefully the rampant flow of not-at-all subtle burn marks all over the city would slow or cease altogether.<p>

* * *

><p>The next day was a weekend. Tsuna spent Saturday mornings sleeping for several hours more than usual, typical of most teenagers. Kyoko's brother was not a typical teenager, going by the copious shouts of "EXTREME!" shattering the morning peace periodically. Well, now he knew who it was that was always so loud in the morning… and afternoon… and evening. Huh. He was loud all the time.<p>

Tsuna went back to sleep, covering his ears with his pillow and doing his best to mute out the deafening "EXTREME!"

* * *

><p>"What is that noise?" a tiny baby robed in red asked. Of course he was not really a baby—he was an Arcobaleno. Reborn called him to help teach his student martial arts. Something about having pathetic physical ability, maybe. His own student, I-pin, walked next to him. His white monkey, Lichi, leapt in between them, excited at being in an unfamiliar country.<p>

It had taken Fon a couple of weeks to straighten out his own affairs—taking a withdrawal from service for an indeterminate amount of time and letting his clients know in advance. No one protested, although it did leave behind a stir of excitement. A predetermined meeting between Arcobaleno was rare, and since Fon didn't say what it was for and there was a suggestion the meeting would take a while, curiosity concerning it was rampant. However no one dared to stick their noses in it. Business concerning Arcobaleno could get dangerous startlingly quickly, and it was better to leave such matters alone.

Currently, Fon and his student were in Namimori, seeking the house that Reborn was inhabiting for the time being. The repetitive shouts of "EXTREME!" had been going on for a while now, and it didn't seem it would stop anytime soon. Reborn actually tolerated these conditions? Fon thought he would be much less accepting of such a disruptive atmosphere. Then again, to live in the mafia, he had to have gotten used to randomness and spontaneity. But still, Reborn had such a short fuse… but _that _incident may have been because he hadn't had his morning coffees yet and it was an especially annoying _famiglia_ that barged into his area. Predictably, they were given no mercy, much less than usual.

Oh, the source of the shouts was getting closer, now roughly one block over. Maybe he could ask the guy for help? Strangely, the area was abnormally devoid of people. What Fon didn't know was that the inhabitants of Namimori knew Ryohei's running schedule and paths and purposely vacated the involved areas to avoid the rambunctious teen. It's not that they disliked the rambunctious teen; he was just hard to handle.

Fon could now see a figure speedily running towards him. A middle-school student with abnormal white hair. Why white? Bleach? But his thin eyebrows were white too. Stress? He looked to be very muscular, implying strenuous exercise, so that couldn't be it. Maybe it was natural. It wouldn't be the first time he saw a child with white hair, although it was rare.

Just as the white-haired teen was about to pass him, Fon called out, "Hey!"

"Huh?" The runner screeched to a stop and looked at the two children and the odd monkey standing on the road. They were very young and small, not even coming up to his knees. "Hello! My name is Ryohei! What did you call me for, little ones?"

"I am Fon, that is Lichi, and this is I-pin," he cordially introduced. "May I please ask you to help us to a location? It's our first time here and we don't have a map."

Ryohei wondered why the baby was speaking so formally, but then the question registered in his mind. "You need help getting somewhere? Sure! I've lived here all my life. Get on, little man! And girl!" he shouted.

The two children easily jumped several times their own height onto his shoulders. Once they were settled and secure, Ryohei roared, "EXTREME RUNNING!" Then he shot off the way he was going. Buildings and the occasional person flashed by as they sped down the road.

Fon wondered how Ryohei was going to get them to their destination when he hadn't even told them the address, but he couldn't shout over the wind caused by running buffeting him and Ryohei's own shouts of "EXTREME!" So he settled back and instead looked over the street names, trying to catch the one he needed. At least they were moving quicker than they were before.

* * *

><p>"Good morning, Natsu," Tsuna yawned out.<p>

"Gao~" the little lion purred back. He nuzzled Tsuna's hand, asking for Flames. Tsuna acquiesced and lit harmless Flames, allowing Natsu to feed. He immediately pounced on the playful fire and bit them down. Once he processed the Flames, only taking a couple of seconds to do so, he leapt off the bed to play.

Tsuna yawned again and finally got out of bed at ten. Gokudera probably went out for breakfast, Reborn disappeared when Tsuna was inactive, and Bianchi usually followed Reborn. Tsuna was most likely currently the only person in the house.

After breakfast—simple Japanese fare—he tracked down Natsu, who had been playing with a lizard he caught and dragged in the house. Tsuna helped the lizard escape—thankfully unhurt, though startled—and took Natsu to the backyard to continue training.

* * *

><p>Fifteen minutes after he started running, Ryohei stopped and asked, "Say, where did you say you had to be?"<p>

Fon, still hanging off his shoulder, replied, "I didn't."

"What?" Then where was he running? Why did he _start_ running?

"You didn't give me a chance to tell you," Fon continued.

Oh, right. As soon as the kids had gotten on, he had shot off. "I am extremely sorry! Will you tell me now?"

Fon smiled, amused. "Yes."

Once he was told the address, Ryohei took off running again. In the same direction. And occasionally blindly taking turns. Fon was sure he'd seen this shop just a few minutes ago…

* * *

><p>Tsuna and Natsu spent the entire morning training together and making progress on new attacks and strategies. The leopards were now backed up with hawks to cover him from above. They continuously flew in an indiscernible pattern in a vague dome-like shape, occasionally breaking form to converge in a single point to attack an imaginary enemy.<p>

Tsuna wore his new cloak over his crown as he practiced. The hood's stiff material hid the points of the crown and covered the top portion of his face, which also helped to hide his identity. Haru did a really nice job on it. Tsuna was already used to moving with a hood on—dealing with obstructed vision and slightly muted hearing—but the material did not distort sound or impair his vision since it fluidly flowed out of the way when he turned his head.

Flared up with attack Flames, Natsu led a pride of ethereal lions and cats, moving as a whole to destroy the boulders Reborn set aside for training. Natsu triumphantly roared as the last of the boulders was crushed by two small panthers and then was quieted as Tsuna rushed to him with soft Flames in hand.

"Natsu, we can't be too loud. Breaking rocks is bad enough, but a lion's roar will definitely draw attention," Tsuna scolded as Natsu enthusiastically licked up the last of the flickering Flames. Now sated, soothed, and satisfied, Natsu rolled onto his side and fell asleep in the sun. Sighing, Tsuna let the last of the incorporeal Flame animals dissipate. He stood back up and looked around the yard. Potholes, shallow craters, shattered shards of rocks, and burn marks littered the lawn. Cleanup would take a while again, it seemed.

He really needed to invest in a training ground.

* * *

><p>Just as he shoved the last boulder piece into the corner of the yard (he really had no idea where to dispose of them, so they were piling up), the now-familiar yell of "EXTREME!" cut through the air. So Ryohei was close by. Shrugging, Tsuna picked up the shovel and started to scoop displaced dirt back into the holes.<p>

Rapid footfalls thundered closer and past the house. That boy had an insane amount of energy and stamina. It was a wonder how he didn't fall over with how much physical exertion he put himself through every day.

"Wait!" a tiny voice shouted out nearly inaudibly over Ryohei. The constant and rhythmic footfalls abruptly stopped, producing a skidding screed as momentum was cut off.

"What is it, little man?" Ryohei yelled.

Not straining to be heard anymore, the first voice spoke calmly. "I think this is the house."

Ryohei's brash footsteps turned around and came close again, stopping close by. "This one?"

"Yes."

A doorbell rang. Tsuna stood curiously, wondering who they were trying to meet with, but there was no sound of an opening door. Maybe they weren't home? Then the bell rang again, and Tsuna realized they were ringing for _his_ house. Hurriedly, he slipped off his shoes and ran inside, coming to a stop at the front door. He unlocked the door and swung it open, seeing Ryohei and a child perched on each of his shoulders.

"Hello, Ryohei-san," Tsuna greeted.

Ryohei looked surprised. "Tsuna! I did not know you live here."

"Haha, yeah," Tsuna laughed. "So what did you come here for? You sounded rushed."

Again, Ryohei was shocked. "You heard us coming? You must have extremely good senses!"

_Well, it's a little difficult _not_ to._ Instead of saying so, Tsuna just nodded.

The baby on Ryohei's right shoulder nudged his neck, moving him back into the main conversation. "Oh, right. These two kids said they needed to come to this house. They didn't tell me why."

_So you brought two suspicious people to my house?_ Tsuna knew not to underestimate people. Regardless of their appearance, they could be dangerous. After all, Reborn looked like a two year old and still held the title of World's Greatest Hitman. Again, Tsuna nodded and hummed to show he was paying attention.

"Little man, this is Tsuna, my sister's friend. Tsuna, this is…" Ryohei trailed off. His face was scrunched up in intense concentration for a few seconds while trying to remember before he gave up. "I extremely forgot your name!"

"Quite alright," the red-clothed baby said. "My name is Fon, and this is I-pin. You were expecting me?"

Really? "Was I?" Tsuna cautiously asked. This sounded like a lead-in to a showy assassination. But surely not even the stupidest assassin would try to commit murder in broad daylight in a residential area…

Seeing the hesitation on Tsuna's face, Fon explained. "Reborn called me to teach his student martial arts. You would be Sawada Tsunayoshi, yes?"

That cleared things up. "Ah, yes! Reborn didn't say you would be here today, though." He got out of the way to let them in. Ryohei shucked off his shoes messily while the two children jumped down from his shoulders. They daintily slipped off their miniature shoes and put them in a corner in neat pairs. The group of three followed Tsuna into the living room while they continued their conversation.

"I didn't give him an arrival date. I just said I'd be here when I was ready," Fon clarified. "I'm sorry for making you wait. It took me a while to get here, didn't it?"

"It's okay. I should be thanking you for taking the time to take me up to teach," Tsuna returned. "Should I set some tea?" he asked his guests.

"That would be extremely nice!"

"It would be appreciated."

The girl said something in what he assumed to be Chinese. It sounded like an affirmative, so he gave a quick "I'll be right back" and walked to the kitchen. Using the electric boiling pot to heat the water quickly, he took out a couple cake slices and his favorite tea leaves, which were on the other side of the cabinet from Reborn's expensive coffee beans. Reborn's favored coffee was so ridiculously strong that any food within half a meter's radius acquired the flavor of the coffee. Tsuna did not like coffee-flavored tea, he found after making that mistake early in their arrangement. Finishing the preparations, he set the tea leaves into the teapot and poured the hot water. He arranged the cakes artfully and placed everything on a tray, which he then took to the living room. After distributing the treats and tea, their discussion continued.

"Reborn _did_ say that coming here would be fun, and you seem to be a pleasant person, so I think this will be a nice vacation from work," Fon started.

"Work? Fon-san, what do you do?" Tsuna inquired curiously.

"You work, Fon-san? You're just a kid though! You should extremely enjoy your childhood!" Ryohei shouted with blazing eyes.

Oh. Tsuna forgot about him because of his uncharacteristic silence, probably from eating the cake. Wait! Ryohei was a civilian, and Fon's job was probably mafia-related. Tsuna didn't inadvertently cause a break in the omertà, did he?

"I'm older than I appear," Fon smoothly replied. "I am a freelancer that takes up reasonable requests. I'm also the world's best martial artist."

"Martial arts? Would you happen to know boxing? Let's have an extreme match!" Ryohei excitedly suggested. "Then you can join my boxing club!"

"Yes, I do know boxing, but I prefer other styles," Fon placidly stated. "And perhaps you should look for people in your age group to join your club. I'm not even in your school."

"You're extremely right!" A blaze of determination burst from Ryohei.

Tsuna covered his eyes. _So bright… Yellow, so… that was the Sun type, if I recall correctly._

"I'm going to look right now! Thanks for the tea and cake, Tsuna!" Ryohei then restarted his run throughout the city, now with a goal of recruitment in mind.

"That boy is so energetic," Fon remarked. "Now, about your training, I'll have to see your fighting style so far to see which fits you the best."

"Would you mind if we put it off until tomorrow? I finished Flame training for today not too long ago, and I'm still tired," Tsuna apologetically asked.

The red-robed baby nodded. "That's fine. We're in no hurry, after all." He raised his teacup for a sip and asked, "Where is Reborn, by the way?"

Tsuna sliced a small bit of his cake and ate a nibble. "I don't know. He comes and goes. He leaves me largely alone to do what I think is necessary. So far, his tutoring methods have been hands-off, just giving me directions and expecting me to complete them." Tsuna shrugged. "It works."

"Is that so? Training for martial arts requires more intimate contact. I hope you don't mind."

Tsuna shook his head, his fluffy brown hair swaying with it. "Not at all."

* * *

><p>Reborn came back when Tsuna was putting away the tea dishes and starting dinner. Fon, I-pin, and Lichi were sleeping together on the couch. Jet lag had finally caught up to them.<p>

The hitman was listening to a report from his Leon-phone. His face belied the early stages of planning. A few minutes later, Reborn hung up, and Leon reverted to his chameleon form. The green reptile skittered to the rim of the fedora while Reborn collected his thoughts. Finally, the hitman spoke. "One of my informants told me that one of the king's spies is coming to Japan."

Fon, who had been roused from his sleep by Reborn's entrance, sleepily rose and rubbed his eyes, Lichi doing the same next to him. I-pin continued to sleep. "The king? What king?" Fon questioned confusedly.

Reborn noticed the martial artist sitting up on the couch. "Oh. So you finally got here. Took you long enough." Then he smirked. "Did I forget to tell you? Tsuna is the prince of Merith. His grandfather is trying to get him back."

* * *

><p>Ridiculously long AN:<p>

To lovleydragonfly: I do have some yaoi moments planned. No _definite_ pairings so far, if ever. I'm still trying to figure out how to incorporate 8059.

To Evanescentfacade: There is no Soul Society, and I doubt I'll be delving much more into Bleach—or any others. The characters of other anime will probably never fight. They show up, they disappear, like Haru in the last chapter... (although she'll probably come back). They're just fill-ins for the slots I need.

To Moka-girl: I made up a whole country. It was either a not-quite crossover or a lot of OCs. And since I generally don't like OCs, I used characters of other anime; I believe I have said something like that before. I actually like when a writer does that. Which tenses do you have a problem with? Can you give me specific examples? Regarding the information dumps, I don't like reading them either, but I am a lazy person… so I figured I'd get rid of the info all at once. I'll try to spread out the information in the future. Maybe someday I'll go back and fix the ones I've already written. This is my first fic, so I can be forgiven for roughness, right? I actually chose a bad time to start writing. School life is… not so good (currently, I have a backlog of one month's worth of history notes to do, which is partially why this chapter took so long), so the quality is less than what I want it to be. I'm on a time constraint, so I edit less than I should. Bad form, I know. As for a beta… maybe I need one…? I probably need an outsider's opinion. My sister is not that helpful in that sense.

Huh. So a lot of people want to see Bel meet Tsuna. That's not coming up in six chapters at _least_. I have something large planned for him. Please wait patiently until the plot gets there. I don't know how far into the KHR plotline I'll be going. So far, I've planned up to the Varia. Now I just have to fill in the details…

In case you didn't see this on my profile, I am giving early notice that my writing may slow or stop altogether in March, April, and May. Possibly earlier. Like now. Apologies.

Uh… I did say I was going to _try_ to keep a weekly schedule. I started writing late, so I finished late. I only write on the weekends. So… you know… I lost motivation and Ryohei's characterization is hard. I'm not sure what to do about Giotto and the First Generation—they're imprints of their souls on the rings, so they're not really there, are they? ANs are getting too long. I'll post responses here if I feel other people may benefit from the information. If not, I'll PM.

Posted: 2/15/15


	8. Chapter 8

A heavy silence permeated the air. Then Fon sighed heavily. "Reborn, what have you gotten into now?"

"I haven't done anything wrong. I'm just doing my job," Reborn callously replied. "Nono said to train Vongola's heir, so I am. That I had to come across him living as a prince in a foreign country has no effect on the end result. He will become Decimo and he can return to his kingdom afterwards."

"Please tell me you at least did not kidnap him," Fon groaned. The Storm Arcobaleno watched the boy in question come out of the kitchen and take a seat on the couch, careful not to disturb the sleeping duo.

"Of course I didn't. He's here willingly; else he would've tried escaping, right? I see no problem."

"That's expected. You wouldn't care about other's problems unless they directly involve you," Fon muttered. Then he said in a louder voice, "And how are you dealing with the king you mentioned before? How long has it been anyways?"

"It's been about two months since we left the kingdom. Tsuna's grandfather was not as willing as his mother to let Tsuna become a mafia boss. So we snuck out." Reborn smirked. It was always entertaining to pull one over a person of high standing. That it was a king he duped made it all the more fun. "I know that he sent his best detective to track us, but since he was unable to, the king has released more onto our trail. It appears more to be a hit-and-miss type of strategy, though. The first detective is trying to follow our trail, but I set up several false leads. It'll take at least a year to work through all of them if we don't give away any clues from here."

"Wait," Tsuna interrupted. "That detective, would it happen to be a teen named Ciel Phantomhive?"

"Yes. Is there a problem?"

Tsuna fiddled with a strand of hair, twirling and tugging at it nervously. "Possibly. He's been my English tutor for the past year or so. I know that he's never needed more than a week or two to solve a case. If it's been two months, he's probably very snappish right now."

Reborn scoffed. "How is that detrimental to us? People make more mistakes when they're angry, which makes them more predictable and easy to track."

"His anger fuels motivation, which accelerates his rate of resolving cases. I don't know how you guys match up in skills, so I can't give you an estimation of which side would win. Reborn may throw Ciel off, or Ciel might burn through the fakes and find us."

"Then I'll have to keep a closer eye on him," Reborn decided and then chuckled lightly. "Well, he won't be a problem for a while at least. The last I heard, he was in Cuba."

"And I guess he has his butler with him," Tsuna added.

"If you mean the tall man with red eyes, then yes. There's also your guard following him around, that orange-haired teen," Reborn answered.

"Ichigo? He's with them?" Tsuna asked, surprised. "Well I guess it makes sense since I'm his charge. If they ever find us, I feel like there will be a lot of friction. Ichigo is not the calmest person, you know. Usually, he's an 'act first, think later' type of guy."

"Oh? How so?" Fon rose up a bit more, interested.

"Hm… there was one incident during my younger years when I got separated from my mother while we were making a visit to the villages near the castle. I don't know how I managed to do that, considering we were surrounded by a circle of guards, but I ended up in a dark area that branched out from the officials' district." Tsuna's eyes turned a little glazed, as if reliving the event. "And there was a guy there who asked me something, but I don't remember what."

"_Hey, kid, wanna make some money?"_

"_Money?" Why would he want money? Tsu-kun already had everything he needed—a home, his mother, and his big brother Ichi. His father was never around, so he figured he didn't have one. He didn't need anyone or anything else. He was happy as is._

_The man, mistakenly thinking that the naïve little boy was interested, got more enthusiastic. "Yeah, boy, and it ain't hard either. Just come here and take off—"_

_The grubby man never got to finish his sentence because of a very angry fourteen-year-old kicking his shin hard enough to make an ominous crack. The man screamed before dropping to his knees, at which point the boy played the situation to his advantage and brought a knee up to smash it into the man's face as he fell. Another snap signaled his nose breaking._

_The molester defeated, Ichigo turned to the confused little prince, who did not comprehend a single second of what just occurred._

"Ichigo found me and beat the guy up quickly. He was still angry when he was taking me back to the castle, and he only calmed down after I hugged him and promised I would stick close to Kaa-san from then on." Tsuna fidgeted a little. "And he still won't tell me what that guy was going to say!"

"I have a feeling you wouldn't want to know," Reborn muttered. "So? Then what?"

"Ichigo wouldn't let me out of his sight for a couple of weeks after that, but then his dad started his training with Zangetsu, so he couldn't be near me all the time anymore. He tried as much as he could, though."

"Who's Zangetsu?"

"Ichigo's spirit partner. He's a Lunar Wolf, the same as Ichigo's dad's partner. A spirit partner allows the human to borrow its power for a short time and enhances strength."

"That sounds useful. Do you have one?"

"No. I never got the chance to bond with one since I was limited to the area around the castle. The areas with bondable and willing spirits are usually in the outer districts, about fifty and above. The most I was able to go to was ten."

"Pity. It could've made your life easier."

Tsuna seemed offended. "You can't think of spirits as a commodity. They stick to you for life, so only those that are compatible to you will bond. They intimately form a bond with the soul itself; they can't just be shed and picked up at convenience."

Reborn looked at the chameleon currently perched on his forearm, staring up at him with shining orange eyes. Leon had been with him throughout his Arcobaleno years up to this point. He didn't need prompting to know what Reborn wanted him to change into. Leon was a loyal partner that Reborn would feel pained to lose. "Point taken," Reborn admitted. Leon made a gurgled purr, and Reborn affectionately rubbed the top of his scaled head.

Tsuna calmed and continued. "As for the others, Sebastian won't act without Ciel's orders for some reason. He'd calmly watch someone die in front of him and not make a move to help unless Ciel tells him to, and Ciel wouldn't order Sebastian to help if he knows that the person committed bad enough crimes. Ciel can tell the important, notable pieces of a person's history just from observing them for a short while, so his judgment doesn't waver. But I've heard that he only ever abandoned one person to die."

"Who was it?" Reborn had a feeling that this detail was important, and he never disregarded his instincts.

"It was a little after he moved to Merith and Grandfather had given him the task of underworld control, similar to what he used to do in his home country. He was eleven at the time, and I think he was tracking down a rapist that murdered his victims. The report he submitted said his target was already beaten badly and bled to death by the time he found him, but during one of my lessons a little while later, Ciel told me that he ordered Sebastian to… cut him up a little bit more. No one bothered to look into it further."

Reborn caught on quickly. "Ah… so the butler ensured him a slow death. Bleeding out is relatively painless compared to other methods of death once enough blood has spilled, but it is a frightening one, knowing that death is certain and imminent." And Ciel coldly watched it all happen.

Reborn had a theory of who the target was. The events of Ichigo and Ciel seemed to correspond just a little too closely to be a coincidence. And Tsuna still didn't catch on… It seemed Tsuna's business sense, strategy, and leadership were excellent, but his physical strength was never built up and his naïveté never got a chance to be slowly worn away.

Tsuna was still so innocent, having never been given a chance to explore the real world until now. The death of the previous heir must've hit the king hard, and now he was suffocating his grandson in overly cautious maneuvers. Tsuna was kept in the castle (although Tsuna did manage to slip his guards occasionally), he wasn't taught how to fight for fear of him getting hurt, and information given to him was censored or withheld altogether. The king was training his current heir insufficiently. Fine. Reborn would fill in the holes that the king left. Tsuna would be a capable prince _and_ mafia heir by the time Reborn deemed his training to be done.

What Reborn didn't understand was why Ciel had decided to have the man killed instead of taking him to be imprisoned for life. To just upright rule his death sentence would mean that he was personally affected in some way. Ciel himself couldn't have been a victim since he had moved there not long before that, and his butler never left his side anyways, so he was constantly protected. He had no relatives there either, as he was the last of his line. The only person he could think of was Tsuna. Tsuna was nearly attacked just a few hours before at most. Ciel might have seen it happen and most likely almost intervene if it was not for Ichigo fortunately finding Tsuna before anything disastrous could happen. Ciel might have felt obligated to get immediate vengeance, or maybe he held affections for his student as well. Of course, it could be that Reborn just had too little information to go on and he was miles off the right answer, but it was not a bad theory either. Tsuna had a natural draw to him that induced feelings of softness and protectiveness. Reborn himself was affected by it, being much easier on Tsuna than he was on Dino. Not that he let Tsuna know—or anyone else, for that matter. He couldn't let his reputation fall, after all.

* * *

><p>After going over a few more details, the conversation looped back to the original problem. "Do you know who is planning to come to Japan?" Fon inquired.<p>

"Yes, just one man by the name of Toshiro Hitsugaya."

Tsuna was mildly surprised. "He's looking for me, too? Grandfather must really want me back."

_So he can hide you away again._ "I'll have to put up more blockers to keep you hidden. If it proves to be useless, then we'll enact plan I, at least temporarily."

"I don't think we'll have to go _that_ far. Like I said, if Grandfather is resorting to Captain Hitsugaya, he's getting impatient. He's not the army's head of investigations for nothing, but he's not that inconspicuous either, so it'll be easy to avoid him when we need to."

"And why is that?" Fon asked.

"Well… he's eleven years old, has white hair, and carries around a sword as long as he is tall."

_He'd definitely stand out, even in Namimori,_ Reborn concluded, but then specific residents came to mind._ Well, maybe not. After all, there is the enthusiastic boxer that has white hair and Nami Chuu's Disciplinary Committee's head that doesn't limit his power to just the school and instead exerts authority over the whole city… Yeah. He'd fit right in._

Fon was startled at the age. "He's just a boy? How did he get into such a high position?" he questioned.

"Hm…" Tsuna hummed, considering. "I heard he bonded with an ice dragon out of loneliness when he was very young, and so he couldn't control his powers. Someone from the army found him after some nearby villagers reported abnormal weather patterns. He was brought to the capital and instructed to learn control. He learned quickly and never left. There's very little chance of an attack on Merith, but just in case, the higher ups decided to put him into the Department of Investigations to reduce the risk of injury. He acclimated well and even became its head."

The rest of the discussion was spent working out a few minor detail and informing Reborn about potential problematic people. Afterwards, Bianchi came and took I-pin to continue sleeping in her room, and Fon was situated in Tsuna's room with another small hammock.

Tsuna was running out of room to house people. The only empty room was the master bedroom, but Tsuna didn't want anyone to stay there. It was his parents' space. Maybe he should consider getting another house? He certainly had the money for it. Maybe one close to the school; then he wouldn't have to worry about being late. Bianchi, Fon, and I-pin could stay in this one while he, Reborn, and Gokudera moved to the new one. But a house that had a large backyard would be better for his training, which wouldn't be available in a strictly urban area. And far from other people—then he would not have to stress over anyone seeing him practice his Flame use… So a house on the outskirts would be better?

Tsuna continued to consider the merits of another house and ideal features as he got ready for bed and went to sleep. Above Tsuna, the tiny hitman looked down from his hammock. Reborn knew what his student was thinking and he agreed; a larger house would be beneficial. He'd have to put that into action—a new house befitting the new generation of Vongola.

* * *

><p>It was a rare day when Tsuna had nothing planned and had invited his Storm Guardian on a lazy walk around Namimori. And Gokudera, instead of watching over his Sky from afar like on a normal day, accepted to accompany him. They stopped by the front of a flower shop to admire the blooming lilies artfully arranged in a large vase.<p>

Another teen, wearing an odd apple hat that hid away most of his abnormal sea-green hair, detached himself from the stream of pedestrians and settled next to them. "Flowers are plants' reproductive systems. So people basically admire the reproductive organs of plants. Perverts," he commented as he looked at the shop.

Tsuna was mildly put off-balance by what the stranger said. "…Were you dropped on your head as a kid?" Gokudera asked.

The other boy swept his eyes to the silver-haired teen and monotonously answered, "How would I know? My memories don't extend that far, and what idiot would tell their child they dropped them? That's careless. How about you then? Ah." He clapped his hands together as if a thought just struck him and an idea was cleared up. "That's why you're always so angry. Your brain took a hit and became deformed."

"I was _not_ dropped as a child, and my frontal lobe is just fine!" the Storm Guardian angrily shouted.

"Is that so? It doesn't seem like it." The expressionless boy then looked toward Tsuna. His next sentence shocked Tsuna. "If I may ask, would you happen to be Tsuna la Alsveith?"

Tsuna and Gokudera jerked in surprise. Reborn readied Leon to shoot. This was a bad situation. Tsuna didn't have his crown and cloak and Natsu was at home, so he wouldn't be able to fight should there be a need. He still hadn't gotten enough control over his Flames to fight without a booster of some sort. Well, if the situation was dire, Reborn could always shoot a Dying Will Bullet. Tsuna would just have to get over it later.

"Tsuna-sama, do you recognize this person?" Gokudera whispered as he huddled closer to his Sky.

"No, not at all," Tsuna whispered back. "I've never seen him in the castle or the surrounding villages. Maybe he's a mercenary?"

"Hey, what are you two muttering about?" The unidentified person moved to walk closer, but Gokudera brandished an unlit stick of dynamite threateningly, so he stepped back.

"Who are you?" Tsuna called out.

"Me? I'm Fran. I'm from the 62nd district of Merith. Nice to meet you." The now-identified Fran waved a hand halfheartedly in greeting. "If you're worried about me reporting your location to the king, don't worry. I wasn't sent here by him."

_He speaks the truth,_ a voice whispered in his mind. Somewhat calmed and feeling relieved, Tsuna let tension flow out of his limbs, but was still prepared to make an escape. "Yes, I am Tsuna. If I may ask, why are you here?"

"No particular reason, really," Fran replied. "I was bored, so I found someone that would give me some entertainment. Your mother is really nice. She offered you to me."

"O-offered?" Gokudera stuttered. "Sh-she offered to give Tsuna-sama to you?"

Fran blinked. "Yes."

A shadow overtook Gokudera's eyes. He stepped in front of the shocked brunet and growled, "I won't let you have him!"

Fran tilted his head slightly, undaunted by the sudden mood change. "Why not? I just want to play with him a little."

The bomber slipped out more dynamite and slotted them in between his fingers, ready to be thrown. "I will not allow Tsuna-sama to be played with and thrown away! He deserves better than that! If you want him, you have to prove yourself worthy."

"But his mother already gave me permission. She overrules you."

"Then I choose to defy her," Gokudera declared.

Sensing an imminent fight, Tsuna smoothly swerved in front of Gokudera and grasped his wrists to prevent him from throwing his weapons. Once secured, Tsuna addressed Fran. "What do you mean by 'offered'?"

"She said you would keep me from being bored. So far, you're doing well. I think I'll stay with you," Fran decided.

_Don't just impose yourself on me,_ Tsuna complained internally. "Is that all, then?" he said instead. At least Gokudera had stopped trying to blast the green-haired boy into pieces, although he was still acting hostile and growling threateningly.

"Were you expecting something else?"

Tsuna sighed. "I guess not. Let's go back home, Gokudera-kun. Fran, do you have a place to stay?"

Fran shrugged. "I thought I would stay with you, so no."

Tsuna mentally calculated the possible places that Fran could be placed. His room was already quite full with Reborn's and Fon's hammocks. Bianchi and I-pin were together, and they were females, so that option wasn't even available. Another futon could be laid out in Gokudera's room. "You can room with Gokudera-kun," Tsuna offered.

Gokudera looked ready to protest but caught himself from refusing his boss. "If that's what Tsuna-sama wants," he acquiesced.

"Thank you." Tsuna smiled brightly at the blushing Storm.

* * *

><p>Tsuna picked up another school registration form and gave it to Fran to fill out. Most of it was made up information, such as his place of birth, because he had no idea what would be an appropriate response. Grandmother's backyard, though true (he was born prematurely for some unexpected reason), didn't seem to be an acceptable answer, and the 62nd district of Merith wasn't on any map except Merith's. He wrote in his grandmother's birthplace instead.<p>

"Will you be okay at school, Fran?" At Fran's blank stare (his stares were always blank, actually), Tsuna clarified. "Regarding the course material, I mean."

Fran nodded. "I might've come from a rural area, but I did have education. I wasn't going to stay there and be a farmer, you know."

"What were you planning to be?" Tsuna inquired curiously.

"A superhero," he intoned in a flat voice, though the sparkle in his normally dull eyes was telling.

* * *

><p>"We have another transfer student. Be kind to him."<p>

"Yes, sensei," the students chorused.

Nezu nodded and called out, "You may come in now."

The door slid open and Fran entered, not wearing his apple hat and therefore allowing his unusually colored hair to be seen. He originally tried to wear it to school, but Tsuna dissuaded him. After weeks of observing the goings-on in school, he picked out the strictness of the Disciplinary Committee in upholding the rules. And Tsuna read the whole manual given to them on their first day, hoping to avoid unfavorable confrontations. Most of them were the expected statutes of a middle school—get to class on time, tardiness and absences must be excused, and so on—but a couple seemed out of place: small animals must not be hurt, the teachers will submit to the Disciplinary Committee, all school activities must be approved of by the head of the Disciplinary Committee, and some others. And all infractions were punished in the same way—to be bitten to death. The Disciplinary Committee of Nami Chuu had a lot more power than those of other schools. Quite unusual. Tsuna wondered why.

Fran stopped at the front of the board. "My name is Fran. I'll be your classmate from now on. Or at least until you drop out or the year passes. Whichever comes first, but judging by your uncomprehending expressions, you'll drop out first."

The ensuing offended cacophony was only quieted when the teacher acknowledged his lost control of his class and the Disciplinary Committee was called in. Silence immediately reigned.

Huh. Maybe that's why they were so strong.

* * *

><p>During lunch, Tsuna chose to stay in the classroom to eat. He handed out bentos to Fran and Gokudera, and the trio opened the packages to eat in their corner in the back of the classroom.<p>

Tsuna observed the class critically. Most students were casually chatting with their classmates and friends while eating lunch, but Yamamoto-kun looked more strained than usual, although no one else could tell.

Tsuna leaned over the aisle between his desk and Gokudera's and spoke loud enough for him to hear over the other voices, "Gokudera-kun, I'm worried."

Gokudera stopped chewing on an eggroll and swallowed to clear his mouth. "What about, Tsuna-sama?"

"Do you see him?" He pointed to the baseball player. "He looks like he's about to fall over." And he really did. Light splotches under his eyes denoted sleep deprivation and his hands shook nervously. Yamamoto laughed at something one of his friends said, but it sounded dead. Again, no one took notice or they chose not to acknowledge it. "Can you keep watch over him for me?" Tsuna would've done it himself, but he needed to show Fran around, and he didn't trust that the green-haired boy wouldn't provoke the volatile bomber into an argument that would escalate into an actual fight just for the sake of entertainment.

"Why, Tsuna-sama? I mean, I'll gladly do it, but his issues don't concern you, do they?"

"I have a feeling something bad will happen…"

* * *

><p>As asked, when Tsuna took Fran to show him around, Gokudera stayed behind and kept watch over the fictitiously happy teen. Then when Yamamoto excused himself and left the classroom, Gokudera followed. He stalked him up two floors, but then was distracted by a couple blatantly making out in the middle of the hallway.<p>

"Get a room!" he growled at them. The two students scurried away, and Gokudera noticed that he lost sight of his charge. "Oh, damn."

Fortunately, his sharp ears picked up the sound of feet hitting stairs, progressively getting farther away. He correctly concluded that Yamamoto was still not on the floor he wanted to be at, but there was not much use on the upper floors. Most of the rooms were unoccupied classrooms, and the only thing above those was the restricted roof, deemed to be so by the claim of one Hibari Kyoya. What was Yamamoto planning?

* * *

><p>As the two handsome and popular boys of 2A made their way up the building, curious students followed them to see what they were up to. To them, it looked like the normally cool and aloof Gokudera was following his crush, the cheerful and energetic Yamamoto. They speculated that Gokudera was going to corner his crush and make a confession, and the interested students not-so-covertly followed them. Yamamoto kept walking to the more isolated part of the school, and Gokudera kept following. Did he know that Gokudera was following him and wanted privacy?<p>

* * *

><p>Yamamoto opened the door to the forbidden rooftop, unhindered by the rusted lock. Gokudera silently followed, but broke his cover once he was able to see Yamamoto's purpose.<p>

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"

The startling shout enticed the nosy students to flood onto the rooftop. They all gasped as they saw what shocked Gokudera and were stunned themselves.

The ever-happy, always cheerful baseball player was on the other side of the chain link fence, about to take a step to death.

"Yamamoto-kun, what are you doing?"

"Yamamoto, get away from there!"

"We haven't won the championship yet!"

The last comment struck Yamamoto hard, and Gokudera could see that. He chuckled lowly, and even the previously oblivious students could hear the emptiness of it. "Do you see what I am worth? A baseball game. People only want to be with me because I am good at playing baseball. Can you guess what would happen if I ever lost my ability to play? I'd be abandoned. It's all I'm good for. I haven't been feeling well lately, and my skills have taken a hit. I can already see people starting to leave me."

Halfhearted protests arose, and Yamamoto laughed bitterly again. "Don't even try to deny it. See what I mean? My so-called 'friends' are fake."

Gokudera climbed over the fence too, and when he found steady footing, he grabbed the front of Yamamoto's shirt and brought his face down to his level. "Don't repress your problems, you idiot! Talk it out with someone!" he yelled at him. "And if your friends are only pretenders, then so what?! Find better ones!"

Yamamoto was surprised. He certainly hadn't expected anyone to go this far for him, to risk their own life to try and save his which he was so willingly trying to get rid of. "I—"

"What?! You don't think you can?" Gokudera snapped.

"But—" He was interrupted again.

"Fine then! I'll be your friend! A real one!" Gokudera declared. "Now, as your friend, I demand that we get away from here!"

_I don't think friends work like that_, Yamamoto thought to himself. _Not that I would know what genuine friends are like… But… it's okay._ He smiled. "Okay!" he replied. _I can tell he has good intentions._ Warmth took over his body, chasing away the feelings of loneliness that previously dominated him.

However, as they were halfway up the fence, the weight of the two teens snapped the corroded bases holding the fence to the roof. The fence bent back, and the two lost balance, losing grip on the broken fence as they fell. The watching students gasped and screamed in horror as they witnessed the impending deaths of their schoolmates.

* * *

><p>"I will <em>not<em> die like this!" Gokudera snarled. He maneuvered his body mid-air to get closer to Yamamoto and grabbed the other teen's shirt. He straddled his body for a better grip, locking his legs tightly around Yamamoto's waist. With his free hand, he yanked out a bomb and hurriedly lit it, protecting the fuse from going out from the wind. He pointed it fuse-side up and threw it like a spear right below them, where they were going to land.

The bomb thrown down detonated, creating a buffeting wind that slowed their descent enough to prevent serious injury, and the resulting pit of sand absorbed most of the leftover impact, although both of them still had scrapes and scratches all over their bodies. The two teens, still with adrenaline running unregulated through their veins, panted harshly as they slowly overcame the shock of falling over ten stories. Gokudera lied tiredly on top of Yamamoto, struggling to get back on his feet. He managed to raise himself up onto his hands and knees, enough to glare heatedly into the eyes of the baseball player who was now smiling more sincerely than before.

"Haha. Sorry," Yamamoto offered.

The silver-haired teen scoffed and got off of Yamamoto completely. "Don't you _ever_ do that again," Gokudera growled.

"Gokudera-kun! Yamamoto-kun! Are you alright?" Tsuna ran out of the building, panicked and worried after witnessing the fall from an adjacent window.

"Just fine, Tsuna-sama. I kept this idiot safe, just like you said to," Gokudera said proudly. He had such a delighted glimmer as he looked at Tsuna. Yamamoto wished he would look at him like that too.

"Your hard heads saved you both, huh? That was predictable." Fran nonchalantly ambled behind the relieved brunet, appearing to be unaffected.

"Shut up, you—" Gokudera's tirade was cut off by an unanticipated entrance, although it really should have been expected, considering all the noise and panic they caused.

"What are you herbivores doing?" That voice… Tsuna only heard it once before when he watched a group of delinquents smoking under the sakura trees during lunch. They were beaten black and blue by that person. "Destruction of school property? I'll bite you to death."

And all of Tsuna's efforts to keep them out of trouble at school were shot down by this one incident.

* * *

><p>Eh. The first section was very boring. Hard to write. I think I need to rewrite the suicide scene. It feels too rushed.<p>

Thanks to those who bothered to drop a word/suggestion/encouragement. A note on pairings: if it's not yaoi, it'll be gen. I can't do het… I'm just not interested.

If Tsuna ever got a spirit partner, what would he have? And should Fran have one? I like Fran, but he is hard to write. I can't seem to do monotonous sassy. Hitsugaya won't show up much, if at all, within my current plans.

Again, I will say updates may slow or stop altogether for the next few months. How annoyed would you be if I posted on April 1st?

Posted: 3/1/15


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